A Song of the Republic

Henry Lawson 1867 (Grenfell) – 1922 (Sydney)



Sons of the South, awake! arise!
Sons of the South, and do.
Banish from under your bonny skies
Those old-world errors and wrongs and lies.
Making a hell in a Paradise
That belongs to your sons and you.

Sons of the South, make choice between
(Sons of the South, choose true),
The Land of Morn and the Land of E'en,
The Old Dead Tree and the Young Tree Green,
The Land that belongs to the lord and the Queen,
And the Land that belongs to you.

Sons of the South, your time will come –
Sons of the South, 'tis near –
The "Signs of the Times", in their language dumb,
Fortell it, and ominous whispers hum
Like sullen sounds of a distant drum,
In the ominous atmosphere.

Sons of the South, aroused at last!
Sons of the South are few!
But your ranks grow longer and deeper fast,
And ye shall swell to an army vast,
And free from the wrongs of the North and Past
The land that belongs to you.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 22, 2023

52 sec read
107

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABAAXB CBXCCB DEDDDE FBFFFB
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 896
Words 175
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 6, 6, 6, 6

Henry Lawson

Henry Lawson 17 June 1867 - 2 September 1922 was an Australian writer and poet Along with his contemporary Banjo Paterson Lawson is among the best-known Australian poets and fiction writers of the colonial period more…

All Henry Lawson poems | Henry Lawson Books

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    "A Song of the Republic" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 19 Mar. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/17714/a-song-of-the-republic>.

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