Beyond the River.
Dear, have we held these dawnings of the day
That come so swift,
And set ablaze the cheerless drooping skies
And bid gloom lift,
When frowning clouds smile gay with rose and gold
Ana opal-glow —
Their poignant beauty thrills me now to grief —
You loved them so.
And words that once you spoke rush through my mind.
“How strange it seems
That one bright dawning I shall lie asleep
Unstirred by dreams.
Although the day will dawn as bright as now
I will not see,
And revel in the magic radiant line
Above the quay.
These careless zephyrs that caress us now
And round us play
Shall bring to you alone their pilfered scents
At peep of day,
And all I hold most dear and cherish best
Will not be mine.
Dear, steadfast friends, the cottage I call Home
Enwreathed by vine.
Though your dear feet shall walk the leaf-strewn path,
Where now I tread,
And birds shall carol for your ears alone,
I shall be dead.
Nor walk this way, nor yet shall hear you pass —
Nor yet shall see
The silent shadows stealing o’er the grass,
Where I shall be.
Where I shall be! Nay, dear, for I, in death,
Shall be reborn,
And shall be waiting till we meet again,
Beyond the dawn.”
A thousand dawns have bloomed since thus you spoke
That fatal morn —
But we shall live and meet and love again
Beyond the dawn.
— K. Tooker.
Source:
The Central Queensland Herald (Rockhampton, Qld.), Thursday 25 November 1937, page 8
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