On Australian Hills

Earth, outward tuning on her path in space

This pensive southern face,

Swathing its smile and shine

In that soft veil that day and darkness twine,

The silver-threaded twilight thin and fine,

With April dews impearled,

Looms like another and diviner world.

Here April brings her garnered harvest-sheaf,

Her withered autumn leaf,

Tintings of bronze and brass;

Her full-plumed reeds, her mushroom in the grass,

Her furrowed fields, where plough and sower pass,

Her laden apple bough.

All are transfigured and transmuted now.

The eastward ranges, so unearthly blue,

Bloom with their richest hue;

Slowly each rose-flushed crest

Deepens to violet where the shadows rest,

Darkens and darkens to the paling west;

The waning sun-fires die;

The first star swims in the pellucid sky.

Soundless to listening ear, on grass and flowers,

The footfall of the hours;

Formless and void to sight

The evolutions of invading night,

The creeping onslaught and the gradual flight,

Until the field is won,

And we look forth to see that day is done.

Then, from their grave of darkness, wood and lawn

Wake to a second dawn.

From unseen wells below

The pearly moon-tides rise and overflow,

Till vale and peak and wide air-spaces glow

In the transfiguring stream,

And earth and life are but a heavenly dream.

And now we hear the fairy-echoes fall

Where distant curlews call,

And how the silence thrills

With the night-voices of the glens and hills,

Rustling in reeds and tinkling in the rills,

Bubbling in creek and pool

Where frogs are wooing in the shallows cool.

And more than these, in this delicious time,

The melody sublime

That inward spirit hears-

The faint and far-off music of the spheres,

Immortal harmonies, too fine for ears

Dulled in the dusty ways,

Deaf with the din of the laborious days.

Whereto, responsive as the vibrant wire

Of some aeolian lyre

Fanned by celestial wings,

The summoned soul in mystic concord brings

The deep notes latent in its trembling strings,

Joining the choir divine

Of all the worlds that in the ether shine.

O sacred hour! O sweet night, calm and fair!

Thou dost rebuke despair;

Thou dost assuage the pain

Of passionate spirit and distempered brain,

And with thy balms, distilled like gentle rain,

Dost heal the fret and smart

And nerve the courage of this coward’s heart.

And lift me up, a Moses on the Mount

To the pure source and fount

Of law transcending law,

Of life that hallows life. I know no more

Of life’s great Giver than I knew before,

But these His creatures tell

That He is living, and that all is well.

Oh, to be there to-night!

To see that rose of sunset flame and fade

On ghostly mountain height,

The soft dusk gathering each leaf and blade

From the departing light,

Each tree-fern feather of the wildwood glade.

From arid streets to pass

Down those green aisles where golden wattles bloom,

Over the fragrant grass,

And smell the eucalyptus in a gloom

That is as clear as glass,

The dew-fresh scents of bracken and of broom . . .

These city clamours mute,

To hear the woodland necromancers play

Each his enchanted lute;

That dear bird-laugh, so exquisitely gay,

The magpie’s silver flute

In vesper carol to the dying day.

To hear the live wind blow,

The delicate stir and whisper of the trees

As light breaths come and go,

The brooklet murmuring to the vagrant breeze,

The bull-frog twanging low

His deep-toned mandolin to chime with these.

And then the whispering rills,

The hushed lone wheel, or hoof, or axeman’s tool;

The brooding dark that stills

The sweet Pan-piping of the grove and pool;

The dimly glimmering hills;

The sleeping night, so heavenly clean and cool.

Oh, for that mother-breast

That takes the broken spirit for repair,

The worn-out brain for rest-

That healing silence, that untainted air,

That Peace of God . . . . . . Blest, blest

The very memory that I once was there.

The thought that someday yet,

In flesh, not dreams, I may return again,

And at those altars, set

In the pure skies, above the smoky plain,

Remember and forget

The joy of living and its price of pain . . . . . .

That sullied earth reserves

Such spacious refuge virgin and apart,

That wasting life preserves

Such sweet retreat for the distracted heart,

Such fount of strength for nerves

Torn in the ruthless struggle of the mart . . . . . .

That Government divine

O’er all this reek of blunders and of woes

Keeps an unravaged shrine

Not here, not there, but in the souls of those

Who neither weep nor whine,

But trust the guidance of the One Who Knows.

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Poems in English 

• Indian Wedding Customs – Eastern and Western Indian Wedding Traditions by Poetry In English
• Latino Author and Educator Provides Tools for College and Life Success by Poetry In English
• The Merchant of Copan [In English and Spanish] by Poetry In English
• Knowing God Part 1 – Finding God, Knowing Him, and Doing His Works by Poetry In English
• The Art of Cake Decorating – A Beginners Recommendation For Cake Decorating Books by Poetry In English
• Creativity: The Top 10 Ways to Increase Your Creativity by Poetry In English
• Learning to Study – Hindrances to Study by Poetry In English
• Feeling Lucky to Be Irish by Poetry In English
• Source of Life – Gives Hope in Adversity? by Poetry In English
• The Importance of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring by Poetry In English
• Work in Game Design Rather Than Other Design by Poetry In English
• 9 Types of Lovers – The Twisted Version by Poetry In English
• May You Encounter Christ’s Inclusive Church by Poetry In English
• Shaun White – The Power Behind the Snowboard Throne by Poetry In English
• Ways to Make Money Online Easily for Free – 4 Important Tips to Make Money Online by Poetry In English
• Stretch Mark Cream – How Creams Help Remove Stretch Marks by Poetry In English
• How To Use Vellum For Your Card Making Ideas by Poetry In English
• Neglecting the Word of God: A Foundational Cause of Lukewarmness by Poetry In English
• Celebrity Style Of The Week: Gabriel Akinosho by Poetry In English
• The Dying of America and How to Save Her by Poetry In English

More external links (open in a new tab):

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Doska or the Board – write anything

Search engines:

Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)

Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.

Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees

Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.

Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.

 

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