Though small in size you stood strong' and wise
In your answer to him, of your intended demise!
And that of our fair state.' In our great land.'
For right here i recount of that old 'dingo dan'
He'd paid the blood money, he's bought a plot'
Oh how my blood boils.' And i can tolerate a lot.)
Its plain he had a dirty plan, to cottaging; that spot; on prime Murray river bank land'
Well it did not come good.' No not at all.!
For a true blue builder, rejected that call
He came like a demon..yet left like a cur.!
On that; may freedom loving Aussies all concur!
Keep shunning the dingo.' May mange be upon him'
I praise our publican, may all blessings be on him.!
Dusk On the Murray River
A crimson red blanket hangs over the river, shrouding its steep muddy banks.
This is dusk on the Murray River, the Mississippi of this great land.
Fifteen hundred miles of slow-flowing water linking state to state and ocean to mountain.
What secrets do your Cod and Trout hide as they navigate your murky waters?
Night arrives quickly here in Echuca.
Dusk is brief at this place which means meeting of the waters.
Overhead Sulphur Crested Cockatoos gather in their masses, screeching their way into my thoughts as they swoop around me.
Darkness falls
I want to stay out as late as possible, delaying my return to a budget hotel with a kicked-in door.
My room in the Caledonian hotel is one of the worst places I have ever laid my head.
The grubby stained carpet is as brown as the river.
Unease comes over me as I try to settle on a lumpy bed.
Sleep will not come
I feel unsafe looking at the kicked-in door.
The sound of the birds fills my head.
Leatherback, murray river, matama
Hawksbill, common musk and spiny soft shell.
Loggerhead, Atlantic green, alligator snapping
Turtles are we, in every country we dwell.
The largest sea turtle reaches eight hundred pounds.
A leatherback whose love for jellyfish abounds.
Alligator snapping is one fourth of leatherback’s weight
Uses pink fleshy flap of lower jaw for bait.
The difference in turtles fascinates me.
I can picture the loggerheads running to the sea.
No matter what country you decide to make your home
There is a turtle close by, even if it is in this poem.
The dust of the deserts,
the dry air, the dry heat
a dust storm approaches
as we run like cockroaches.
The scene is golden
no green in sight,
some might call this a delight.
our farmers in a drought,
but they work, no less,
without a plenty of food
YES, we stress.
We sit on the couch
to have a beer,
turn on the news,
there's plenty to hear.
The Murray River
big and brown
surrounded by gumtrees
like a crown.
We camp
we fish
we ski,
there is always plenty to see.
We awake to a sunrise
t begin a new day
the decision is yours,
where would you like to be?
I am the bushland dawning
in the stillness of the morning
I am the sunlit plains
and the mighty river's flow
I'm the drought and I'm the flood
I'm the earth and I'm the blood
I'm the breezes ever blowing
where the wild pandanas grow
I'm the stockman and the drover
and I've walked this land all over
and I share forgotten secrets
that the wild ones only know
I'm the dust of outback trails
I'm the wind that fills the sails
I'm the city and the country
and the first high mountain snow
I'm the Murray River flowing
and the cattle softly lowing
I'm the kangaroo and emu
and the sunset's orange glow
I'm the Southern Cross at night
the explorer's guiding light
I'm the place that tells the traveller
that it's better to go slow
I am Banjo and I'm Lawson
I am Kelly and I'm Mawson
I am the Melbourne Cup
and the Sydney Easter Show
I am wild and still untamed
and there's beauty in my name
I am the land Australia
where the lucky people go.
From my PDF book "Bush Ballads and Bulldust"
By the Murray
is far from
By the lake
The Murray
has its own sound
as it meanders
across gravel runs
billabongs
bends galore
tonight will be cold
so the fire is prepped
7 sheets of crumpled
newspaper, splinters of pine
dry eucalyptus leaves
twigs and small branched
neatly piled
the cod are rising
at dusk
gently taking insects
from the surface
By the lake
would be
no sound
at all
The majestic Murray cod is native to Australia's inland rivers including the Murray River. It grows to a maximum size of about 6 foot and 250 lb in weight. The maximum estimated age is about 50 years. Divers in clear water are often confronted by these huge gentle fish that are very curious. Those that stare eye-to-eye with these magnificent creatures in the wild, or in tanks in captivity, are spooked and deeply affected by the experience. I was part of a team of scientists that established the age and growth of Murray cod. I live in awe of them to this day. Take a trip and stare eye-to-eye with a cod before you die.
Big Fella Cod
Murray cod sublime
when met, looked at eye to eye
so deeply profound
Big ol Billy
Near old Dirran, on the river, an old time pub had its day. ..
Billy Richards was the owner, had a rupture so they say. ..
There he sold the watered whisky and the rum to all who'd pay...
Earned a quid and made a nest egg till the Murrays' came his way. ..
Sitting on his front verandah chanting
calling laughing low, .."Big ol Billy, Big ol Billy," soon the rum began to flow. ..
So enlarged was Billy's rupture, so apparent his dismay, ..
every time the chanting started, fiery rum, he'd have to pay...
In the early nineteen hundreds medicine was touch and go, ...
poisons nasty, drugs so deadly, all were used by the medico...
Not the knife for Big ol Billy, fifty fifty die that way. ..
Better get another keg, stop the Murray's chanting, hey? ...
The Murray's were Aboriginal people living on the Murray river.near the south west
Queensland town of Dirranbandi.
Sponsor Brian Strand
Contest Name 1-14 any theme /form max 14 LINES
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