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Henry Lawson - The Song of the Darling River
Work rating: Low

The skies are brass and the plains are bare, 
     Death and ruin are everywhere — 
     And all that is left of the last year`s flood 
     Is a sickly stream on the grey-black mud; 
     The salt-springs bubble and the quagmires quiver, 
     And — this is the dirge of the Darling River: 

     `I rise in the drought from the Queensland rain, 
     `I fill my branches again and again; 
     `I hold my billabongs back in vain, 
   `For my life and my peoples the South Seas drain; 
   `And the land grows old and the people never 
   `Will see the worth of the Darling River. 

   `I drown dry gullies and lave bare hills, 
   `I turn drought-ruts into rippling rills — 
   `I form fair island and glades all green 
   `Till every bend is a sylvan scene. 
   `I have watered the barren land ten leagues wide! 
   `But in vain I have tried, ah! in vain I have tried 
   `To show the sign of the Great All Giver, 
   `The Word to a people: O! lock your river. 

   `I want no blistering barge aground, 
   `But racing steamers the seasons round; 
   `I want fair homes on my lonely ways, 
   `A people`s love and a people`s praise — 
   `And rosy children to dive and swim — 
   `And fair girls` feet in my rippling brim; 
   `And cool, green forests and gardens ever` — 
   Oh, this is the hymn of the Darling River. 

The sky is brass and the scrub-lands glare, 
   Death and ruin are everywhere; 
   Thrown high to bleach, or deep in the mud 
   The bones lie buried by last year`s flood, 
   And the Demons dance from the Never Never 
  To laugh at the rise of the Darling River.
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