In lonely watches night by night
Great visions burst upon my sight,
For down the stretches of the sky
The hosts of dead go marching by.

Strange ghostly banners o’er them float,
Strange bugles sound an awful note,
And all their faces and their eyes
Are lit with starlight from the skies.

The anguish and the pain have passed
And peace hath come to them at last,
But in the stern looks linger still
The iron purpose and the will.

Dear Christ, who reign’st above the flood
Of human tears and human blood,

Under the wide and starry sky
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me;
"Here he lies where he longed to be,
Home is the sailor, home from sea,
And the hunter home from the hill."

We're marching along, we're gath'ring strong'
We place on our right reliance,
We fling in the air, for all who care,
Our first loud notes of defiance!
We fling in the air,
For all who care,
Our first loud notes of defiance!

Laugh long and loud, you toady crowd,
At the men you call benighted,
In spite of your sneers, we are pioneers
Of "Australian States United"!
In spite of your sneers, We are pioneers
Of "Australian States United"!

Not long we'll stand as an outlaw band,
And be in our country lonely,

Had I but known yesterday,
Helen, you could discharge the ache
Out of the cloud;
Had I known yesterday you could take
The turgid electric ache away,
Drink it up with your proud
White body, as lovely white lightning
Is drunk from an agonised sky by the earth,
I might have hated you, Helen.

But since my limbs gushed full of fire,
Since from out of my blood and bone
Poured a heavy flame
To you, earth of my atmosphere, stone
Of my steel, lovely white flint of desire,
You have no name.

Chloe's hair, no doubt, was brighter;
Lydia's mouth more sweetly sad;
Hebe's arms were rather whiter;
Languorous-lidded Helen had

Eyes more blue than e'er the sky was;
Lalage's was subtler stuff;
Still, you used to think that I was
Fair enough.

Now you're casting yearning glances
At the pale Penelope;
Cutting in on Claudia's dances;
Taking Iris out to tea.
Iole you find warm-hearted;
Zoe's cheek is far from rough-
Don't you think it's time we parted? . . .
Fair enough!

Long before the dawn breaks

With a bird's cry,

I'll be hustling on the wind

Out where you lie -

Hurrying to our rendezvous

Under the April sky.

I'll step from out the sea again

To the shoulder of the land,

And pass the dead boy where he lies

Prone on the tideless strand,

Treading lightly lest I move

His fingers in the sand.

Do you remember how you stopped

After the sudden climb,

Sniffing the air as one who comes

On a holy thing sublime?

All I could see from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood;
I turned and looked another way,
And saw three islands in a bay.
So with my eyes I traced the line
Of the horizon, thin and fine,
Straight around till I was come
Back to where I'd started from;
And all I saw from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood.
Over these things I could not see;
These were the things that bounded me;
And I could touch them with my hand,
Almost, I thought, from where I stand.

I looked down on a daisied lawn
To where a host of tiny eyes
Of snow and gold from velvet shone
And made me think of starry skies.

I looked up to the vasty night
Where stars were very small indeed,
And in their galaxy of light
They made me think of daised mead.

I took a daisy in my hold;
Its snowy rays were tipped with rose,
And with its tiny boss of gold
I thought--how like a star it glows!

I dreamt I plucked from Heaven's field
A star and held it in my hand.
Said I: "The might of God I wield,

1.

Award, and still in bonds, one day
I stole abroad,
It was high-spring, and all the way
Primros'd, and hung with shade;
Yet, was it frost within,
And surly winds
Blasted my infant buds, and sin
Like clouds eclips'd my mind.

2.

Storm'd thus; I straight perceiv'd my spring
Mere stage, and show,
My walk a monstrous, mountain's thing
Rough-cast with rocks, and snow;
And as a pilgrim's eye
Far from relief,
Measures the melancholy sky
Then drops, and rains for grief,

3.

Ten miles down Reedy River
A pool of water lies,
And all the year it mirrors
The changes in the skies,
And in that pool's broad bosom
Is room for all the stars;
Its bed of sand has drifted
O'er countless rocky bars.

Around the lower edges
There waves a bed of reeds,
Where water rats are hidden
And where the wild duck breeds;
And grassy slopes rise gently
To ridges long and low,
Where groves of wattle flourish
And native bluebells grow.

Beneath the granite ridges
The eye may just discern