Roxborough Man
Now the chattering guns have ceased
Now the battlefields are bared
Now we walk where history teased
The convictions of those who stared
I climb the hill to see again
The land that yields its children who toil
For fruit where no father remain;
I climb to see ploughs ripping the soil
Of ignorance, snobbery, and superiority
False, where the boy swings the axe
And find stray cattle enjoying fake liberty:
The man who makes the law must use the tax.
Now the riffling pages turn no more
Nor siblings buried far from home
Now the fisherman pulls his boat to shore
And the athlete rests beneath the loam
I hear the silence of the courts and wonder
What genius does justice lack in defense
Who speaks when the voiceless in blunder
Is stripped of dignity and common sense?
Where is the advocate from Roxborough
Where the hero in the mudded trench
So much congenial goodness in that fellow
We are the bolts but he was our wrench.
The man from Roxborough was our prince
Our knight in shining armour of truth
He was the reason the world was convinced
Men have souls who crouched like brutes.
The man of Roxborough was a different kind
A class that did not stand for class
A scholar with a peasant's candor and mind
A vision clear as taintless liquid in a glass.
Roxborough man, father of the federal design,
Roxborough man, we are fifty and remember
How yielding to kindness, you made us shine
Such a big bush of fire from a small ember.
Copyright © David Smalling | Year Posted 2012
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