A B Banjo Paterson Poems

The London lights are far abeam
Behind a bank of cloud,
Along the shore the gaslights gleam,
The gale is piping loud;
...

The roving breezes come and go
On Kiley's Run,
The sleepy river murmurs low,
And far away one dimly sees
...

There's some that ride the Robbo style, and bump at every stride;
While others sit a long way back, to get a longer ride.
There's some that ride as sailors do, with legs, and arms, and teeth;
And some that ride the horse's neck, and some ride underneath.
...

The news came down on the Castlereagh, and went to the world at large,
That twenty thousand travelling sheep, with Saltbush Bill in charge,
Were drifting down from a dried-out run to ravage the Castlereagh;
And the squatters swore when they heard the news, and wished they were well away:
...

Now the stock have started dying, for the Lord has sent a drought;
But we're sick of prayers and Providence -- we're going to do without;
With the derricks up above us and the solid earth below,
We are waiting at the lever for the word to let her go.
...

It was somewhere up the country, in a land of rock and scrub,
That they formed an institution called the Geebung Polo Club.
They were long and wiry natives from the rugged mountain side,
And the horse was never saddled that the Geebungs couldn't ride;
...

There came a stranger to Walgett town,
To Walgett town when the sun was low,
And he carried a thirst that was worth a crown,
Yet how to quench it he did not know;
...

Now the autumn maize is growing,
Now the corn-cob fills,
Where the Little River flowing
Winds among the hills.
...

In this war we're always moving,
Moving on;
When we make a friend another friend has gone;
Should a woman's kindly face
...

It was while we held our races --
Hurdles, sprints and steplechases --
Up in Dandaloo,
That a crowd of Sydney stealers,
...