An Anthology of Australian Verse Part 23

Jessie Mackay.

The Grey Company

O the grey, grey company Of the pallid dawn!

O the ghostly faces, Ashen-like and drawn!

The Lord's lone sentinels Dotted down the years, The little grey company Before the pioneers.

Dreaming of Utopias Ere the time was ripe, They awoke to scorning, The jeering and the strife.

Dreaming of millenniums In a world of wars, They awoke to shudder At a flaming Mars.

Never was a Luther But a Huss was first -- A fountain unregarded In the primal thirst.

Never was a Newton Crowned and honoured well, But first, alone, Galileo Wasted in a cell.

In each other's faces Looked the pioneers; Drank the wine of courage All their battle years.

For their weary sowing Through the world wide, Green they saw the harvest Ere the day they died.

But the grey, grey company Stood every man alone In the chilly dawnlight, Scarcely had they known Ere the day they perished, That their beacon-star Was not glint of marsh-light In the shadows far.

The brave white witnesses To the truth within Took the dart of folly, Took the jeer of sin; Crying "Follow, follow, Back to Eden gate!"

They trod the Polar desert, Met a desert fate.

Be laurel to the victor, And roses to the fair, And asphodel Elysian Let the hero wear; But lay the maiden lilies Upon their narrow biers -- The lone grey company Before the pioneers.

A Folk Song

I came to your town, my love, And you were away, away!

I said "She is with the Queen's maidens: They tarry long at their play.

They are stringing her words like pearls To throw to the dukes and earls."

But O, the pity!

I had but a morn of windy red To come to the town where you were bred, And you were away, away!

I came to your town, my love, And you were away, away!

I said, "She is with the mountain elves And misty and fair as they.

They are spinning a diamond net To cover her curls of jet."

But O, the pity!

I had but a noon of searing heat To come to your town, my love, my sweet, And you were away, away!

I came to your town, my love, And you were away, away!

I said, "She is with the pale white saints, And they tarry long to pray.

They give her a white lily-crown, And I fear she will never come down."

But O, the pity!

I had but an even grey and wan To come to your town and plead as man, And you were away, away!

Dunedin in the Gloaming

Like a black, enamoured King whispered low the thunder To the lights of Roslyn, terraced far asunder: Hovered low the sister cloud in wild, warm wonder.

"O my love, Dunedin town, the only, the abiding!

Who can look undazzled up where the Norn is riding, -- Watch the sword of destiny from the scabbard gliding!

"Dark and rich and ringing true -- word and look for ever; Taking to her woman heart all forlorn endeavour; Heaven's sea about her feet, not the bounded river!"

"Sister of the mountain mist, and never to be holden With the weary sophistries that dimmer eyes embolden, -- O the dark Dunedin town, shot with green and golden!"

Then a silver pioneer netted in the rift, Leaning over Maori Hill, dreaming in the lift, Dropped her starry memories through the pa.s.sioned drift: --

"Once -- I do remember them, the glory and the garden, Ere the elder stars had learnt G.o.d's mystery of pardon, Ere the youngest, I myself, had seen the flaming warden --

"Once even after even I stole ever shy and early To mirror me within a glade of Eden cool and pearly, Where shy and cold and holy ran a torrent sought but rarely.

"And fondly could I swear that this my glade had risen newly, -- Burst the burning desert tomb wherein she lieth truly, To keep an Easter with the birds and me who loved her duly."

Wailing, laughing, loving, h.o.a.r, spake the lordly ocean: "You are sheen and steadfastness: I am sheen and motion, Gulfing argosies for whim, navies for a notion.

"Sleep you well, Dunedin Town, though loud the lulling lyre is; Lady of the stars terrene, where quick the human fire is, Lady of the Maori pines, the turrets, and the eyries!"

The Burial of Sir John Mackenzie

(1901)

They played him home to the House of Stones All the way, all the way, To his grave in the sound of the winter sea: The sky was dour, the sky was gray.

They played him home with the chieftain's dirge, Till the wail was wed to the rolling surge, They played him home with a sorrowful will To his grave at the foot of the Holy Hill And the pipes went mourning all the way.

Strong hands that had struck for right All the day, all the day, Folded now in the dark of earth, Veiled dawn of the upper way!

Strong hands that struck with his From days that were to the day that is Carry him now from the house of woe To ride the way the Chief must go: And his peers went mourning all the way.

Son and brother at his right hand All the way, all the way!

And O for them and O for her Who stayed within, the dowie day!

Son and brother and near of kin Go out with the chief who never comes in!

And of all who loved him far and near 'Twas the nearest most who held him dear -- And his kin went mourning all the way!

The clan went on with the pipes before All the way, all the way; A wider clan than ever he knew Followed him home that dowie day.

And who were they of the wider clan?

The landless man and the no man's man, The man that lacked and the man unlearned, The man that lived but as he earned -- And the clan went mourning all the way.