Written by
Rafael Guillen |
I came with the rising sun and I've brought
nothing but two eyes, all I have,
simply two eyes, for the harvest
of grief that's hidden in this jungle
like the coffee shrubs.
Fewer,
but they fling themselves upwards, untouchable,
are the trees that invidiously shut out
the light from this overwhelming indigence.
With my machete I go through the paths
of the cafetal.
Intricate paths
where the tamags lies in wait, sunk
in the luxuriant vegetation of the tropics,
the carnal luxury that gleams
in the eyes of the Creole overseer; sinuous
paths between junipers and avocados
where human thought, cowed
since before the white man, has never
found any other light than the well
of Quich; blind; drowning in itself.
Picking berries, the guanacos
hope only for a snort to free them
from the cafetal.
Through the humid shade beneath
the giant ceibas, Indian women
in all colors crawl like ants, one
behind the other, with the load balanced
on a waking sleep.
They don't exist.
They've never been born
and still they are dying daily, rubbed raw,
turned to wet earth with the plantation,
hunkered for days in the road to watch over the man
eternally blasted on booze, as good as dead
from one rain to the next, under the shrubs
of the cafetal.
The population has disappeared
into the coffee bean, and a tide of white lightning
seeps in to cover them.
I stretch out a hand, pluck
the red berry, submit it to the test
of water, scrub it, wait for the fermentation
of the sweet pulp to release the bean.
How many centuries, now? How much misery
does it cost to become a man? How much mourning?
With a few strokes of the rake, the stripped bean
dries in the sun.
It crackles, and I feel it
under my feet.
Eternal drying shed
of the cafetal!
Backwash of consciousness,
soul sown with corn-mush and corn cobs,
blood stained with the black native dye.
Man below.
Above, the volcanos.
Guatemala throws me to my knees
while every afternoon, with rain and thunder,
Tohil the Powerful lashes
this newly-arrived back.
Lamentation
is the vegetal murmur, tender
of the cafetal.
Glossary:
Cafetal: a coffee plantation
tamag?s: a venomous serpent
guanaco: a pack animal, used insultingly to indicate the native laborers
ceiba: a tall tropical hardwood tree
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Written by
Andrew Barton Paterson |
The roving breezes come and go
On Kiley's Run,
The sleepy river murmurs low,
And far away one dimly sees
Beyond the stretch of forest trees --
Beyond the foothills dusk and dun --
The ranges sleeping in the sun
On Kiley's Run.
'Tis many years since first I came
To Kiley's Run,
More years than I would care to name
Since I, a stripling, used to ride
For miles and miles at Kiley's side,
The while in stirring tones he told
The stories of the days of old
On Kiley's Run.
I see the old bush homestead now
On Kiley's Run,
Just nestled down beneath the brow
Of one small ridge above the sweep
Of river-flat, where willows weep
And jasmine flowers and roses bloom,
The air was laden with perfume
On Kiley's Run.
We lived the good old station life
On Kiley's Run,
With little thought of care or strife.
Old Kiley seldom used to roam,
He liked to make the Run his home,
The swagman never turned away
With empty hand at close of day
From Kiley's Run.
We kept a racehorse now and then
On Kiley's Run,
And neighb'ring stations brought their men
To meetings where the sport was free,
And dainty ladies came to see
Their champions ride; with laugh and song
The old house rang the whole night long
On Kiley's Run.
The station hands were friends I wot
On Kiley's Run,
A reckless, merry-hearted lot --
All splendid riders, and they knew
The `boss' was kindness through and through.
Old Kiley always stood their friend,
And so they served him to the end
On Kiley's Run.
But droughts and losses came apace
To Kiley's Run,
Till ruin stared him in the face;
He toiled and toiled while lived the light,
He dreamed of overdrafts at night:
At length, because he could not pay,
His bankers took the stock away
From Kiley's Run.
Old Kiley stood and saw them go
From Kiley's Run.
The well-bred cattle marching slow;
His stockmen, mates for many a day,
They wrung his hand and went away.
Too old to make another start,
Old Kiley died -- of broken heart,
On Kiley's Run.
.
.
.
.
.
The owner lives in England now
Of Kiley's Run.
He knows a racehorse from a cow;
But that is all he knows of stock:
His chiefest care is how to dock
Expenses, and he sends from town
To cut the shearers' wages down
On Kiley's Run.
There are no neighbours anywhere
Near Kiley's Run.
The hospitable homes are bare,
The gardens gone; for no pretence
Must hinder cutting down expense:
The homestead that we held so dear
Contains a half-paid overseer
On Kiley's Run.
All life and sport and hope have died
On Kiley's Run.
No longer there the stockmen ride;
For sour-faced boundary riders creep
On mongrel horses after sheep,
Through ranges where, at racing speed,
Old Kiley used to `wheel the lead'
On Kiley's Run.
There runs a lane for thirty miles
Through Kiley's Run.
On either side the herbage smiles,
But wretched trav'lling sheep must pass
Without a drink or blade of grass
Thro' that long lane of death and shame:
The weary drovers curse the name
Of Kiley's Run.
The name itself is changed of late
Of Kiley's Run.
They call it `Chandos Park Estate'.
The lonely swagman through the dark
Must hump his swag past Chandos Park.
The name is English, don't you see,
The old name sweeter sounds to me
Of `Kiley's Run'.
I cannot guess what fate will bring
To Kiley's Run --
For chances come and changes ring --
I scarcely think 'twill always be
Locked up to suit an absentee;
And if he lets it out in farms
His tenants soon will carry arms
On Kiley's Run.
|
Written by
Andrew Barton Paterson |
Come all you little rouseabouts and climb upon my knee;
To-day, you see, is Christmas Day, and so it’s up to me
To give you some instruction like—a kind of Christmas tale—
So name your yarn, and off she goes.
What, “Jonah and the Whale”?
Well, whales is sheep I’ve never shore; I’ve never been to sea,
So all them great Leviathans is mysteries to me;
But there’s a tale the Bible tells I fully understand,
About the time the Patriarchs were settling on the land.
Those Patriarchs of olden time, when all is said and done,
They lived the same as far-out men on many a Queensland run—
A lot of roving, droving men who drifted to and fro,
The same we did out Queensland way a score of years ago.
Now Isaac was a squatter man, and Jacob was his son,
And when the boy grew up, you see, he wearied of the run.
You know the way that boys grow up—there’s some that stick at home;
But any boy that’s worth his salt will roll his swag and roam.
So Jacob caught the roving fit and took the drovers’ track
To where his uncle had a run, beyond the outer back;
You see they made for out-back runs for room to stretch and grow,
The same we did out Queensland way a score of years ago.
Now, Jacob knew the ways of stock—that’s most uncommon clear—
For when he got to Laban’s Run, they made him overseer;
He didn’t ask a pound a week, but bargained for his pay
To take the roan and strawberry calves—the same we’d take to-day.
The duns and blacks and “Goulburn roans” (that’s brindles), coarse and hard,
He branded them with Laban’s brand, in Old Man Laban’s yard;
So, when he’d done the station work for close on seven year,
Why, all the choicest stock belonged to Laban’s overseer.
It’s often so with overseers—I’ve seen the same thing done
By many a Queensland overseer on many a Queensland run.
But when the mustering time came on old Laban acted straight,
And gave him country of his own outside the boundary gate.
He gave him stock, and offered him his daughter’s hand in troth;
And Jacob first he married one, and then he married both;
You see, they weren’t particular about a wife or so—
No more were we up Queensland way a score of years ago.
But when the stock were strong and fat with grass and lots of rain,
Then Jacob felt the call to take the homeward road again.
It’s strange in every creed and clime, no matter where you roam,
There comes a day when every man would like to make for home.
So off he set with sheep and goats, a mighty moving band,
To battle down the homeward track along the Overland—
It’s droving mixed-up mobs like that that makes men cut their throats.
I’ve travelled rams, which Lord forget, but never travelled goats.
But Jacob knew the ways of stock, for (so the story goes)
When battling through the Philistines—selectors, I suppose—
He thought he’d have to fight his way, an awkward sort of job;
So what did Old Man Jacob do? of course, he split the mob.
He sent the strong stock on ahead to battle out the way;
He couldn’t hurry lambing ewes—no more you could to-day—
And down the road, from run to run, his hand ’gainst every hand,
He moved that mighty mob of stock across the Overland.
The thing is made so clear and plain, so solid in and out,
There isn’t any room at all for any kind of doubt.
It’s just a plain straightforward tale—a tale that lets you know
The way they lived in Palestine three thousand years ago.
It’s strange to read it all to-day, the shifting of the stock;
You’d think you see the caravans that loaf behind the flock,
The little donkeys and the mules, the sheep that slowly spread,
And maybe Dan or Naphthali a-ridin’ on ahead.
The long, dry, dusty summer days, the smouldering fires at night;
The stir and bustle of the camp at break of morning light;
The little kids that skipped about, the camels’ dead-slow tramp—
I wish I’d done a week or two in Old Man Jacob’s camp!
But if I keep the narrer path, some day, perhaps, I’ll know
How Jacob bred them strawberry calves three thousand years ago.
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Written by
Rudyard Kipling |
My New-Cut ashlar takes the light
Where crimson-blank the windows flare.
By my own work before the night,
Great Overseer, I make my prayer.
If there be good in that I wrought
Thy Hand compelled it, Master, Thine--
Where I have failed to meet Thy Thought
I know, through Thee, the blame was mine.
The depth and dream of my desire,
The bitter paths wherein I stray--
Thou knowest Who hast made the Fire,
Thou knowest Who hast made the Clay.
Who, lest all thought of Eden fade,
Bring'st Eden to the craftsman's brain--
Godlike to muse o'er his own Trade
And manlike stand with God again!
One stone the more swings into place
In that dread Temple of Thy worth.
It is enough that, through Thy Grace,
I saw nought common on Thy Earth.
Take not that vision from my ken--
Oh whatsoe'er may spoil or speed.
Help me to need no aid from men
That I may help such men as need!
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