Rex Ingamells Poems
- 1. The Camp Fires Of The Past
A thousand, thousand camp fires every night,
in ages gone, would twinkle to the dark
from crest and valley in the rolling bush,
from mulga scrub and mallee scrub, from dunes
... - 2. Captain William Bligh
Look for an iron soul to bear the piled
anathema of time, to take, without
abjectness, scorn of every human rout,
colossal though by all the world defiled!
... - 3. Ship From The Thames
Stay, ship from Thames with fettered sails
in Sydney Cove, this ebb of tide;
your gear untangled from the gales,
imprisoned at your anchor ride.
... - 4. News Of The Sun
The noon is on the cattle-track;
the air is void of sound,
except where crows, poised burning-black,
cry to the dusty ground.
... - 5. Macquarie Harbour
Macquarie Harbour jailers lock
the sullen gates no more.....
but lash-strokes sound in every shock
of ocean on the dismal rocks
... - 6. Shifting Camp
Glint of gumtrees in the dawn,
so million coloured: bush wind-borne
magpie-music, rising, falling;
and voices of the stockmen calling.
... - 7. Boomerang
This piece of hardwood, cunningly shaped,
was curved so evenly while piccaninnies gaped
at a Warrior who chipped at it with pieces of flint,
and formed it by meticulous dint upon dint.
...
