Our Rampant Coat-Of-Arms

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



The Lion and the Unicorn
Of England's Coat-of-Arms
Seldom make bold, so we are told,
To ravage English farms.
In fact, 'tis said by travellers
Who lately have been there,
That lions hardly ever roam
About the dales and dells at Home,
And unicorns are rare.

But in this topsy-turvy land
Where often - inter alia
Strange forms of bird, in ways absurd,
 Are grafted to mammalia.
And beasts have bills to fit the goose,
Our crazy Coat-of-Arms breaks loose
To roam at night and play the deuce
'Mid farmers in Australia.

The Lion and the Unicorn
Stay put and emplematic;
But kangaroos bluntly refuse
To function, staid and static.
And emus stray to ruin farms,
Raising excursions and alarms;
Which proves such things, on Coats-of-Arms
Are plainly too erratic.

Far better chain them to the shield
Like unicorns in Britain.
Else, by what chance may we 'advance'
As in the motto written?
If not, and they get out of hand,
Before the nations we must stand
Ever a topsy-turvy land
By its own emblem smitten.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

53 sec read
99

Quick analysis:

Scheme Abxbxcddc efxfgggf Ahxhbbbh xixieeei
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 973
Words 178
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 9, 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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