Shearing Shed

The yards behind the shearing shed are overgrown with grass And the fence posts look a little worse for wear There’s cobwebs on the tractors that are sitting all forlorn And a farm cat snoozes gently on a chair The boards have not been trodden by a shearer’s boot for years But the remnants of their trade lie on the floor A dull and rusty hand piece was left hanging on the wall And an old grey fleece is draped across a door A fridge that held refreshments for the shearers long ago Stands rusting in the corner on its own Some wool bales from the final clip are sitting in a pile And the wind whips through the rafters with a moan The only sign of movement is the farm cat getting up It must be time to go and hunt for tea As she slinks between the barrels that are holding up the floor It’s time for mice to hide, or turn and flee A drowsy looking blowfly buzzes lazily around And the morning slowly turns to afternoon Then the purple shades of evening slide across the waving fields And the shearing shed is bathed beneath the moon Then somewhere in the darkness you can hear the shearer’s ghosts you can hear them clipping long into the night Cries of ‘fleece off!’ are competing with the bleating of the sheep but silence reigns again come morning light And the shed just goes on rusting underneath the summer sun And the termites come and chew upon the boards And the spiders in the tractors go on spinning silken webs And the shearer’s ghosts are undisputed lords From my PDF book "Bush Ballads and Bulldust"