Bushmen

Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis 1876 (Auburn) – 1938 (Melbourne)



Rugged men and tough men these,
Men of the lonely ways,
Hard and sturdy as their trees
Where the timbered ranges raise
Their ragged crests to rake the sky;
For the call has come again,
As oft it came in the years gone by,
And the Bush sends forth her men.

Silent men, with eyes alert,
Tramping the hillside steep,
Where the giant trees at the mountain's skirt
Their lonely vigil keep;
Fighting their way where the tangled fern
Covers an ancient track,
Plying the lore that the bushmen learn
Thro' the lonely years outback.

The men of the forest are out once more,
Searching early and late.
As they searched thro' many a day before,
For many a missing mate.
Or a wandering stranger gone astray
In the land of the towering tree,
That has become for all today
The land of tragedy.

And, while the task is a task for men,
Ne'er will they call a stop.
They will tramp the wild bushland again,
And tramp until they drop,
With never a thought for the hours ill-spared
From the labor of the day
To the men of the forest whom fate has dared,
There's nought but to obey.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:01 min read
94

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABABCDCD EFEFGHGH IJIJKLKL DMDMNKNK
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 1,036
Words 202
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8, 8

Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis

Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis, better known as C. J. Dennis, was an Australian poet known for his humorous poems, especially "The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke", published in the early 20th century. Though Dennis's work is less well known today, his 1915 publication of The Sentimental Bloke sold 65,000 copies in its first year, and by 1917 he was the most prosperous poet in Australian history. Together with Banjo Paterson and Henry Lawson, both of whom he had collaborated with, he is often considered among Australia's three most famous poets. While attributed to Lawson by 1911, Dennis later claimed he himself was the 'laureate of the larrikin'. When he died at the age of 61, the Prime Minister of Australia Joseph Lyons suggested he was destined to be remembered as the 'Australian Robert Burns'. more…

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    I wandered lonely as a _______ that floats on high o'er vales and hills
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