A Son Of The Soil Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABAC DEDE AFAF GHGH IJIJ KLML KNMO MHMHAPAP MQ MQ RSRS DTDT RORN UVUV AMAM AMAM MMMM MOMN A| Said the Preacher All is Vanity appending as a reason | A |
| That the things we find our pleasure in are bound to pass and pall | B |
| But it seems to me that whatso'er endureth for a season | A |
| Isn't half as vain as whatso'er hath never been at all | C |
| - | |
| When you find that what you've hitherto been wont to make a boast of | D |
| Must be numbered with the ejects that from muddled brains proceed | E |
| When you find that in respect thereof there isn't ev'n a ghost of | D |
| Fact to back it up ah then you may cry Vanity indeed | E |
| - | |
| From my tend'rest years I've plumed myself on being an Australian | A |
| An Australian pure and simple of the most authentic brand | F |
| Scotchman Englishman and Irishman alike to me were alien | A |
| I was sibber to King Billy through our common mother land | F |
| - | |
| To the pride of local genesis my being was surrendered | G |
| The worthiest of immigrants I looked upon with scorn | H |
| As exotic interlopers under foreign skies engendered | G |
| Though transplanted to my country fifty years ere I was born | H |
| - | |
| What although they wove the fabric of Australia's starry banner | I |
| From the fibre of their being till the tissue was complete | J |
| 'Twas for us the young to wave it in our own emphatic manner | I |
| In the face of all things ancient European and effete | J |
| - | |
| Ours the fitter hand to hold the reins I sedulously boasted | K |
| And whenever at the festal board occasion would allow | L |
| Australia for the Australians with a hip hooray I toasted | M |
| And to day I learn I'm no more an Australian than a Chow | L |
| - | |
| Would to heav'n I'd been content to play the Native single handed | K |
| Nor sought to be enrolled in that accurs d A N A | N |
| But the vain ambition seized me to be registered and branded | M |
| As an organised Australian and I gave myself away | O |
| - | |
| Not long to crush my fondest pride the ruthless Council tarried | M |
| Yester eve I made my overtures the answer came at morn | H |
| Dear Sir at last night's meeting 'twas unanimously carried | M |
| That a person born at Battersea is not Australian born | H |
| At Battersea At Battersea Unwitting of objection | A |
| I had hardly even looked at my certificate of birth | P |
| Which now Returned herewith brought dimly back to recollection | A |
| A tale of my nativity on t'other side the earth | P |
| - | |
| How my mother rest her soul by wayward appetences fretted | M |
| Cried aloud for the Old Country and a breath of English air | Q |
| - | |
| How my father ripe for holiday her last caprice abetted | M |
| And I a mere expectancy went them unaware | Q |
| - | |
| And though the self same year in shining dells of myrtle found me | R |
| Where the wattle shed its perfume and the lories flashed their gems | S |
| And the white acacia blossoms flaked the verdure allaround me | R |
| I had been born in London on the Surrey side of Thames | S |
| - | |
| Oh vanity of vanities the birth I made a boast of | D |
| Oh unsubstantial eject of an inadvertent brain | T |
| And the self confounding sentiment I made so brave a toast of | D |
| Gr r I danced on my certificate and even that was vain | T |
| - | |
| - | |
| I have slept upon the question I have faced the problem squarely | R |
| At the favoured hour of wisdom when the darkness turns to grey | O |
| I have reckoned up nativity impartially and fairly | R |
| And I've come to the conclusion they are fools the A N A | N |
| - | |
| If begotten of and from the soil what lack I to be native | U |
| What matters where my skin first felt the chill of mundane airs | V |
| If my origin was here in this alluvium procreative | U |
| Whose substance reached me through two generations of forbears | V |
| - | |
| That an accidental deviousness in time of incubation | A |
| Should make my whence irrelevant and pin me to Whereat | M |
| Do they really mean to play on me with calm deliberation | A |
| A pyramidal orbicular absurdity like that | M |
| - | |
| But no matter Let them hug their narrow canons of admission | A |
| The A N A are not the only natives in the land | M |
| There is yet another outlet for my dominant ambition | A |
| I will hie me to King Billy he will take me by the hand | M |
| - | |
| He will lead me to his tribe on slight preliminary payment | M |
| As a resurrected ancestor my status shall be fixed | M |
| As a native of the natives I will rid me of my raiment | M |
| I will rub me with goanna grease and charcoal intermixed | M |
| - | |
| I'll adorn my head with feathers and to decorate my body | M |
| I will grave it o'er with diagrams and fill the grooves with clay | O |
| I will capture me a lubra by the suasion of a waddy | M |
| And who'll be native then my high and mighty A N A | N |
| - | |
| Australian Natives' Association | A |
James Brunton Stephens
(1)
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