From Fame to Fowls

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



Mr Blenkinsop and I
Are much concerned to learn
That, somewhere in the further sky,
A frightful heat-belt lurks on high,
Where torrid ethers burn.
And I and Mr Blenkinsop
We take it rather hard,
Because all work will have to stop
Henceforth within the small work-shop
In Blenkinsop's back-yard.

For many years we labored there,
In Blenkinsop's back-yard.
And, in our town, plain folk would stare
And mutter: 'That's the learned pair
Who'll win the world's regard.'
We planned a gadget in that shop
To journey to the moon;
And deferential friends would stop
To speak to me and Blenkinsop
And ask of our balloon.

We'd built the thing of bits and scraps,
And loomed amongst our peers
As very scientific chaps;
Tho' privily we meant, perhaps,
To dodge the trip for years,
If not for e'er.  But, while remained
The possibility,
Vast oodles of renown we gained,
And fulsome praise our townspeople rained
On Blenkinsop and me.

Alas for me and Blenkinsop!
Our name is mud in town;
For we have come an awful flop.
Gone is the kudos of our shop
And gone our vast renown.
Now I and Blenkinsop, my pard,
Walk 'mid derisive howls;
Although his lot is not so hard,
For in the Blenkinsop back-yard
Our ship now shields his fowls.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:07 min read
79

Quick analysis:

Scheme abaabcdccD eDeedcfccf ghgghijiij ckcckdxddg
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 1,183
Words 220
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 10, 10, 10, 10

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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