Classic Poem

So you rode from the range where your brothers “select,”

Through the ghostly grey bush in the dawn---

You rode slowly at first, lest her heart should suspect

That you were glad to be gone;

You had scarcely the courage to glance back at her

By the homestead receding from view,

And you breathed with relief as you rounded the spur,

For the world was a wide world to you.



Grey eyes that grow sadder than sunset or rain,

Fond heart that is ever more true

Firm faith that grows firmer for watching in vain---

She’ll wait by the sliprails for you.



Ah! The world is a new and a wide one to you,

But the world to your sweetheart is shut,

For a change never comes to the lonely Bush girl

From the stockyard, the bush, and the hut;

And the only relief from the dullness she feels

Is when ridges grow softened and dim,

And away in the dusk to the sliprails she steals

To dream of past meetings “with him.”



Do you think, where, in place of bare fences, dry creeks,

Clear streams and green hedges are seen---

Where the girls have the lily and rose in their cheeks,

And the grass in midsummer is green---

Do you think now and then, now or then, in the whirl

Of the city, while London is new,

Of the hut in the Bush, and the freckled-faced girl

Who is eating her heart out for you?



Grey eyes that are sadder than sunset or rain,

Bruised heart that is ever more true,

Fond faith that is firmer for trusting in vain---

She waits by the sliprails for you