• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

The Institute of Australian Culture

Heritage, history, and heroes; literature, legends, and larrikins

  • Home
  • Articles
  • Biographies
  • Books
  • Ephemera
  • Poetry & songs
  • Slang
  • Timeline
  • Topics
    • Anzac Day
    • Australia Day
    • Australian Aborigines
    • Australianism
    • Australian literature
    • The Eureka Rebellion
    • Explorers
    • Significant events and commemorative dates

Skeleton Creek [poem by Kenneth Mackay]

28 April 2016 · Leave a Comment

[Editor: This poem by Kenneth Mackay was published in Stirrup Jingles from the Bush and the Turf and Other Rhymes (1887).]

Skeleton Creek.

Where leaves are wet with tears of spring,
And odours rare of wattle bloom
Float on the breath of winds that bring
From forest depths a strange perfume

Of scent distilled from tender leaves,
And waving grass and forest flowers; —
(For living mid them who believes
No fragrance fills the Austral bowers) —

By feet of gums whose topmost limbs
Debar the glare with ramparts green,
A silver streak of curves and whims,
The hurrying creek sings on unseen

Save by the birds who bathe them there,
Or skim athwart its rippling breast,
That from its bosom they may bear
Some insect to their leafy nest;

Or beasts that come when suns are low
From wilder depths of scrub and glen,
And barren plains where fancies glow,
And gleam, and break the hearts of men.

Who, lost amid the drear expanse,
Behold with eyes by torture dimned
Great phantom lakes whose waters dance
Through isles and trees, by demons limned

To lure them on with fevered haste
That they may find but sand and stones,
And help to fill the ghoulish waste
With broken hearts and bleaching bones.

Yet, it were wrong to say the creek
Knew only things that creep or fly,
For one who both could think and speak
Had come beside its stream to die.

Who he had been, or why he came
Through barren lands of sun and thirst,
It matters not, since praise or blame
For him had done its best or worst;

The form that once might laugh or weep
Has mingled with its parent clay;
In mouldering bones foul insects creep,
And mock their god of yesterday.

In days to come some other eyes
Perchance may find what I have seen;
But, to the one who vainly tries
To fathom what that past had been,

And strives to trace by place or sign
If days with him were good or ill —
How much of gall, and what of wine
Had gone his cup of life to fill —

I this would say: the past belongs
For ever to yon crumbling sod;
No part of thine his sins or wrongs, —
His final judge, not man, but God.



Source:
Kenneth Mackay, Stirrup Jingles from the Bush and the Turf and Other Rhymes, Sydney: Edwards, Dunlop & Co., 1887, pages 20-21

Editor’s notes:
Austral = of or relating to Australia or Australasia; Australian, Australasian; an abbreviation of Australia, Australian, Australasia, Australasian; in a wider context, of or relating to the southern hemisphere; southern, especially a southern wind

dimn = an archaic form of “dim”

limn = to draw or paint on a surface; or to outline in clear sharp detail; or describe in words (from Middle English “limnen”, to illuminate, with regard to manuscripts, possibly derived from the Latin “illuminare”)

mid = of or in the middle of an area, group, position, etc.

yon = an abbreviation of “yonder”: at a distance; far away

Old spelling in the original text:
thine (your; yours)

Filed Under: poetry Tagged With: Kenneth Mackay (author) (1859-1935), poem, SourceSLV, Stirrup Jingles from the Bush and the Turf and Other Rhymes (Kenneth Mackay 1887), year1887

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Australian flag, 100hThe Institute of Australian Culture
Heritage, history, and heroes. Literature, legends, and larrikins. Stories, songs, and sages.

Featured books

The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses, by Banjo Paterson A Book for Kids, by C. J. Dennis  The Bulletin Reciter: A Collection of Verses for Recitation from The Bulletin The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke, by C. J. Dennis The Complete Inner History of the Kelly Gang and Their Pursuers, by J. J. Kenneally The Foundations of Culture in Australia, by P. R. Stephensen The Australian Crisis, by C. H. Kirmess Such Is Life, by Joseph Furphy
More books (full text)

Featured lists

Timeline of Australian history and culture
A list of significant Australiana
Significant events and commemorative dates
Australian slang
Books (full text)
Australian literature
Rock music and pop music (videos)
Folk music and bush music (videos)
Early music (videos)
Recommended poetry
Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
Australian explorers
Topics
Links

Featured posts

Advance Australia Fair: How the song became the Australian national anthem
Brian Cadd [music videos and biography]
Ned Kelly: Australian bushranger
Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]

Some Australian authors

E. J. Brady
John Le Gay Brereton
C. J. Dennis
Mary Hannay Foott
Joseph Furphy
Mary Gilmore
Charles Harpur
Grant Hervey
Lucy Everett Homfray
Rex Ingamells
Henry Kendall
“Kookaburra”
Henry Lawson
Jack Moses
“Dryblower” Murphy
John Shaw Neilson
John O’Brien (Patrick Joseph Hartigan)
“Banjo” Paterson
Marie E. J. Pitt
A. G. Stephens
P. R. Stephensen
Agnes L. Storrie (Agnes L. Kettlewell)

Recent Posts

  • Vale! Percy Mahoney [by H. A. Burton, 14 December 1950]
  • Early-day sportsman’s death [obituary of Percy Mahoney, 7 December 1950]
  • Visits to the IAC site from various countries
  • Poems by J. Shaw Neilson [book review, 22 December 1923]
  • “Australia in Palestine” [book review, 6 November 1919]

Top Posts & Pages

  • The Man from Snowy River [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Clancy of The Overflow [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Surely God was a Lover [poem by John Shaw Neilson]
  • The drover’s wife [by Henry Lawson]

Categories

Archives

Posts of note

The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]
A Book for Kids [by C. J. Dennis, 1921]
Click Go the Shears [traditional Australian song, 1890s]
Core of My Heart [“My Country”, poem by Dorothea Mackellar, 24 October 1908]
Freedom on the Wallaby [poem by Henry Lawson, 16 May 1891]
The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
Nationality [poem by Mary Gilmore, 12 May 1942]
The Newcastle song [music video, sung by Bob Hudson]
No Foe Shall Gather Our Harvest [poem by Mary Gilmore, 29 June 1940]
Our pipes [short story by Henry Lawson]
Rommel’s comments on Australian soldiers [1941-1942]
Shooting the moon [short story by Henry Lawson]

Search this site



For Australia


Copyright © 2022 · Log in