Francis Duggan Poems

That from hard work and endeavour up the social rank you will rise
To me anyhow does seem a pack of lies
'Tis just an old cliche that and nothing more
That some like to quote and we have heard before.
...

To live a settled existence to him would be living a lie
As the wander bug will be in him till he die
He has been to many big towns in the big World out there
The man who could not settle down anywhere
...

Usually used by a man greeting another man the Aussie terminology 'Mate'
A term colonial man brought from England that now seems out of date
Often used in greeting strangers a term of greeting nothing more
An Aussie antiquated word that lives on born of another shore
...

I've often wondered why he did not stay
In his green country all those miles away
Since nostalgia he has not yet outgrown
And he still refers to Northampton as home? .
...

'Twas not the streams and hills that brought me back home
Or the marvellous scenery of the countryside
No it is something that I cannot explain
For my years of absence I have felt inside.
...

Only knew she never married dear kind hearted Nancy Gray
And never thought that she had children but that's not so one known to say
One who know her better than I say that Nancy had a son
But that he never came home to her when the battle had been won.
...

He has one wish for the future a small house beside the sea
Where the wild waves of Pacific keep on rumbling ceaselessly
Phillip Island or San Remo, Cape Paterson or Inverloch
Just a small house by the ocean on a quarter acre block.
...

A poor enough fellow is Simon though he owns a half acre block
On hill off of Cape Paterson coast road about two miles from Inverloch
His block has a for sale sign on it for he can't afford to build there
He needs every dollar he can get since he has to live on welfare.
...

Their ancestors were brought to Australia from places far away
From foreign parts Calcutta and Delhi and Bombay
Familiar birds with a familiar call
The Indian Mynas known to one and all.
...

The Yobbo takes his mates out for a drive
And the faster he accelerate the greater is their thrill
The other motorists at the speed limit drive
And he pass them as if they were standing still.
...