• 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
    • Recommended poetry
    • Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
    • Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
    • Rock music and pop music [videos]
    • Early music [videos]
  • Slang
  • Timeline
    • Timeline of Australian history and culture
    • Calendar of Australian history and culture
    • Significant events and commemorative dates
  • Topics

Otahai [poem by E. J. Brady]

1 October 2016 · Leave a Comment

[Editor: This poem by E. J. Brady was published in The Earthen Floor (1902).]

XXI.

Otahai.

On the beach at Otahai
You remember, you and I,
And the rollers on the bars,
And the moonlight and the stars —
On that beach at Otahai
You’ll remember, — you and I.

What’s the use a sailor loving?
Round the world for ever roving;
What’s the use to think or care,
Keep or lose or hold or share?
What’s the use to laugh or sing
What’s the good of anything?

But the wind was in your hair,
And your face was sunset fair,
And I saw the starlit skies
Mirrored in your dreaming eyes,
As the night went laughing by
On that beach at Otahai.

Then the leaves like lace hung down
From the sleeping palm tree’s crown;
Then we heard the sea birds call,
Heard the night tide rise and fall —
Loving, dreaming, you and I,
On the beach at Otahai.

Ah! that warm, white, night perfumed
When the rollers broke and boomed,
When our hearts were beating so,
Ah! that night of long ago!
Ah! that night — and you and I
On the beach at Otahai!

Still the palm trees dance and sway
In the moonlight far away;
Still the sea birds dip and call,
Still the long tides rise and fall;
Still the laughing night goes by
On the beach at Otahai.

Life is ashes! Even so
For that night of long ago —
All the days I have to live,
Ah, so freely would I give —
For that night and you and I,
On the beach at Otahai.

What’s the use a sailor loving,
Round the world forever roving?
What’s the good to laugh or sing?
What’s the good to-day, to-morrow,
Life or Death, or Joy or Sorrow —
What’s the good of anything?




Source:
E. J. Brady, The Earthen Floor, Grafton (N.S.W.): Grip Newspaper Co., 1902

Filed Under: poetry Tagged With: E. J. Brady (1869-1952) (author), poem, SourceSLV, The Earthen Floor (E. J. Brady 1902), year1902

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published.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

Primary Sidebar

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

Search this site

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

  • A billabong: Goulbourn River [postcard, 27 November 1907]
  • Dear Mac [postcard, early 20th Century]
  • The New to the Old [poem by Randolph Bedford, 3 January 1896]
  • New Year greetings [postcard, early 20th Century]
  • New Year greetings [postcard, early 20th Century]

Top Posts & Pages

  • Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]
  • Australian slang
  • Timeline of Australian history and culture
  • Click Go the Shears [folk music, lyrics; traditional Australian song, 1890s]
  • The Man from Snowy River [poem by Banjo Paterson]

Archives

Categories

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]

Recent Comments

  • Annie Crestani on Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]
  • Peter Pearsall on The Clarence [poem by Jack Moses]
  • Trevor Hurst on Timeline of Australian history and culture
  • Ju on Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]
  • David Carroll on Queensland [poem by Philip Durham Lorimer]

For Australia

Copyright © 2023 · Log in