An Interlude Of Peace - The Fairy West Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: A BCBCDEDEFF BGBGBHBHFF IJIJBKBKFF LMLMLFLFFF LGLGNONOFF A PQPQRQRQFF BEBELSLS DSDSDTDT UVUVDWDW BXBXTYTY BZBZBJBJ A2B2A2B2NTNTTT TC2TC2I | A |
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We wrote and sang of a bush we never | B |
Had known in youth in the Western land | C |
Of the dear old homes by the shining river | B |
The deep clear creeks and the hills so grand | C |
The grass waved high on the flat and siding | D |
The wild flowers bloomed on the banks so fair | E |
And younger sons from the North came riding | D |
To vine clad homes in the gardens there | E |
We wrote and sang and the Lord knows best | F |
Oh those dear old songs of the fairy West | F |
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We dreamed and sang of the bustling mother | B |
The brick floored kitchen we saw so clear | G |
The pranks and jokes of the youngest brother | B |
The evening songs of our sisters dear | G |
The old man dozed in the chimney corner | B |
Or smoked and blinked at the cheerful blaze | H |
Or yarned with a crony old Jack Horner | B |
Who'd known him back in the Digging Days | H |
We worked and sang and the Lord knows best | F |
Oh those dear old homes of the fairy West | F |
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By tracks that ran 'neath the granite ridges | I |
The children played on their way from school | J |
By the fairy dells and the sapling bridges | I |
And stole a swim in the willowed pool | J |
And home they flocked with their ceaseless chatter | B |
Till happy and tired and washed and fed | K |
The wash came after it doesn't matter | B |
They said their prayers and they went to bed | K |
We worked and dreamed and the Lord knows best | F |
Oh those dear old ways of the fairy West | F |
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We rose at daylight refreshed and hearty | L |
And drank our tea while the children slept | M |
We worked with the zest of a camping party | L |
While the morning breeze through the gum trees crept | M |
We worked till the signal of Breakfast ready | L |
And ate our fill of the good land's best | F |
And Jimmy and Mary and Nell and Teddy | L |
And all the children were washed and dressed | F |
Oh those grand old farms of pleasure and rest | F |
In the fairy tales of the Golden West | F |
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'Twas a land overflowing with milk and honey | L |
And eggs and bacon and butter and beer | G |
We came to Sydney with whips of money | L |
To see the world about twice a year | G |
The girls got married to rich young farmers | N |
And did no work save to populate | O |
And we had the pick of the city charmers | N |
And took our brides to the country straight | O |
We dreamed and sang and the Lord knows best | F |
Oh those dear old dreams of the fairy West | F |
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II | A |
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I dreamed last night of those days long vanished | P |
And buried in bitterness out of sight | Q |
The scene was gone and the folk were banished | P |
And this is the vision I saw last night | Q |
It may be false and it may be real | R |
It may be wrong and it may be right | Q |
A sort of set off to the grand ideal | R |
We'll call it A Vision of Sandy Blight | Q |
We dreamed and sang and you know the rest | F |
The Sandy Blight in the Wondrous West | F |
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The daylight comes to the skillion winder | B |
A hole with never a breath of air | E |
And never a pane of glass to hinder | B |
The reek from the pig sty adjacent there | E |
The skillion cowers in the daybreak ghostly | L |
Criminal like as skillions do | S |
It is fashioned of bark and bagging mostly | L |
And furnished with bark and bagging too | S |
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Swiftly too swiftly the light comes creeping | D |
Round the corners cobweb immeshed | S |
To the dusty bunk where the boys lie sleeping | D |
Gummy eyed dirty and unrefreshed | S |
Huddled like monkeys I'm tired of coining | D |
Rhyme to brighten this cheerful lay | T |
A bang on the slabs of the room adjoining | D |
Git up Are yer gaunter lay there all day | T |
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Three hides of bones in the yard are bailed up | U |
We called 'em k'yows when my heart was young | V |
A pitiful calling where calves are railed up | U |
A stifling cloud from the powdered dung | V |
A dusty and sleepy head is boring | D |
Into the flank of each dusty cow | W |
Milk dust and burrs in the buckets pouring | D |
Three skinny youngsters are milkin' now | W |
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And rainy weather I would be plainer | B |
The filthy tail and the plunging hoof | X |
The worst came out in the home made strainer | B |
But more came down from the dairy roof | X |
Seven cows each and the calves are poddied | T |
The pigs are fed while the boys can creep | Y |
They've done the work of the able bodied | T |
And one sits down in the dust to sleep | Y |
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The skimmin' and scaldin' in loo' warm water | B |
And cloudy at that and the churnin' done | Z |
The hopeless face of the elder daughter | B |
The narrowed mind of the elder son | Z |
The sulky scowl of the younger brother | B |
The morning greeting of you're a fool | J |
The rasping voice of the worn out mother | B |
Now git yer breakfus' an' git ter school | J |
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Three miles to the school house and often more in | A2 |
The sparser districts it makes me sick | B2 |
Mountins and rivers and parsin' and drorin' | A2 |
Readin' and writin' and 'rithmetic | B2 |
Sewin' an' singin' and objeck lessins | N |
Spellin' dicktashin' home lessins too | T |
A bit of relegin for all these blessin's | N |
And home in a hurry to milk the Coo | T |
We slaved and sang and the Lord knows best | T |
Oh those dear old homes of the fairy West | T |
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P S I was in Yewklid the day I finished | T |
Me edyercashun in those times dim | C2 |
My younger brother cleared out to Queensland | T |
'Twas mountains and rivers that finished him | C2 |
Henry Lawson
(1)
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