The Drovers In Reply Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABC AADD AEE AAFF GGDD EEFF AAHH DDAA AAA AABCWe are wondering why those fellows who are writing cheerful ditties | A |
Of the rosy times out droving and the dust and death of cities | A |
Do not leave the dreary office ask a drover for a billet | B |
And enjoy 'the views ' 'the campfires ' and 'the freedom' while they fill it | C |
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If it's fun to travel cattle or to picnic with merinoes | A |
Well the drover doesn't see it few poetic raptures he knows | A |
As for sleeping on the plains beneath 'the pale moon' always seen there | D |
That is most appreciated by the man who's never been there | D |
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And the 'balmy air ' the horses and the 'wondrous constellations ' | - |
The 'possum rugs and billies and the tough and musty rations | A |
It's strange they only please the swell in urban streets residing | E |
Where the trams are always handy if he has a taste for riding | E |
- | |
We have travelled far with cattle for the very best of reasons | A |
For a living we've gone droving in all latitudes and seasons | A |
But have never had a mate content with pleasures of this kidney | F |
And who wouldn't change his blisses for a flutter down in Sydney | F |
- | |
Night watches are delightful when the stars are really splendid | G |
To the sentimental stranger but his joy is quickly ended | G |
When the rain comes down in sluice heads or the cutting hailstones pelter | D |
And the sheep drift with the blizzard and the horses bolt for shelter | D |
- | |
Don't imagine we are soured but it's peculiarly annoying | E |
To be told by city writers of the pleasures we're enjoying | E |
When perhaps we've nothing better than some fluky water handy | F |
Whilst the scribes in showy bar rooms take iced seltzer with their brandy | F |
- | |
The dust in town is nothing to the dust the drover curses | A |
And the dust a drover swallows and the awful thirst he nurses | A |
When he's on the hard macadam where the wethers cannot browse and | H |
The sirocco drives right at him and he follows twenty thousand | H |
- | |
This droving on the plain is really charming when the weather | D |
Isn't hot enough to curl the soles right off your upper leather | D |
Or so cold that when the morning wind comes hissing through the grasses | A |
You can feel it cut your eyelids like a whip lash as it passes | A |
- | |
There are bull ants in the blankets wicked horses cramps and 'skeeters ' | - |
And a drinking boss like Halligan or one like Humpy Peters | A |
Who is mean about the rations and a flowing stream of curses | A |
From the break of day to camping through good fortune and reverses | A |
- | |
Yes we wonder why the fellows who are building chipper ditties | A |
Of the rosy times out droving and the dust and death of cities | A |
Do not quit the stuffy office ask old Peters for a billet | B |
And enjoy the stars the camp fires and the freedom while they fill it | C |
Edward Dyson
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