Francis Duggan Poems

At this time of year in South Eastern Australia the white backed magpies sing night and day
You hear them piping in the moonlight when brush tail possums in their cloaks of gray
Are fighting for to defend their borders on galvanize roofs and on trees
The noise of their snarlings is carrying through the quiet streets in the freshening breeze
...

Were I born with the gift of poesy I'd write of the beauty I see
The unrivalled beauty of Nature that is everywhere around me
I'd pen my songs to Mother Nature I've loved her since I was a boy
From her people are always learning and lessons from her I enjoy,
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The paddocks looking yellow where the capeweed does bloom
And bright golden flowers on the gorse and the broom
And the flute of the shrike thrush is pleasant to hear
In the prime of September in the Spring of the year
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One of her young male admirers has penned for her a song
The lovely brown haired one the Darling of Geelong
In her early twenties and in her life's prime
She blooms like a rare Rose of the Summer time,
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The young man of the sixties tells of his glory days
On the day that his team won the flag he was singled out for praise
Shouldered by his team mates to the dressing rooms his goal had won the day
To the applause of the happy fans such memories never fade away
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On a tall beech tree the black and gray hooded crow
Caws in the gloaming where the Blackwater flow
Through the fields of Duhallow babbling on down
Through that old quiet countryside towards Mallow Town.
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With words he surely has a way he is one of literary note
And he is as good as any this bloke Sullivanthepoet
And his poems will be remembered when others into oblivion fade
It is true about good wordsmiths they are born and cannot be made
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Though I've done my share of travel I don't have much to show of Worldly gain
And 'tis been awhile and many Seasons since I've seen old Clara in the rain
And the fog crawl down the mountain on days cold enough to snow
And Finnow swollen by stormwater through the old fields bank high flow.
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Out there in the World of the wild and the free
The grey shrike thrush pipes on the black wattle tree
Though some other birds to look at than him seem more fair
There is so much beauty in his wildborn air,
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I never said to you I was a poet
Or even one of minor literary note
And the stuff I pen I could not hope to sell
The literary purists call it doggerel
...