Half-lost in film of faintest lawn,
A single star in armour
Upon the dreamy heights of
Guards dim frontier of the night,
Till plumed
And golden
Have washed its trembling light away.
The sun has peeped above the blue;
His level lances as they
Have shot the dew-drops thro' and thro',
And dashed with rubies all the grass,
And silver
Of horse-bells
Floats softly o'er the jewelled ground.
The sunbeam and the wanton wind,
Among the feathery tufts at play,
Sing to the earth: "The night is blind,
But we will kiss your tears away."With broad'ning
And rippling
Adown the laughing leagues they go.
The vagrant lark on wayward
Is fluttering low, is floating high;
No Northern trill of rapture
Tho' the vast temple of the sky;
But not in
Thy southern strain,
Thou brown-winged angel of the plain!
Here, where the days are dull and grey,
And youth has stilled his joyous song,
In fancy yet I love to
By creek, and plain, and billabong,
To the curlew's
And the noiseless
Of the unshod hoof 'neath the gum-trees tall.
I hear one more the plovers "peet:"The grey hawk wheels in dizzy height,
And swift beneath my horse's
The brown quail rises in his fright,
And the galahs
With pink breasts high,
A rosy cloud in a cloudless sky.
Afar I mark the emu's run;
The bustard slow, in motley clad;
And, basking in his bath of sun,
The brown snake on the cattle-pad,
And the reddish
Of a dingo's
As he loit'ring slinks on my horse's track.
And now I watch, with slackened rein,
The scattered cattle, hundreds strong,
As slowly moving home
The lazy vanguard feeds
To the waters
Of the tree-fringed
In the distant creek when the noon is full.
Slip girth and let the old horse graze;
The noon grows heavy on the air.
Kindle the tiny camp-fire's blaze,
And neath the shade, as monarch there,
Take thou thine ease:
For hours like theseA king had bartered satrapies!
Here lie and watch, thro' smoke-wreaths cool,
By yon sunk log and floating wrack,
The emporer of the silent pool,
The stately heron, white and black,
Afar from heat,
Upon his beat,
Knee-deep in shallowy retreat.
O mellow air!
O sunny light!
O hope and youth that pass away!
Inscribe in letters of
Upon each heart one golden day -To be there
When we
There is a joy in living yet!
