Francis Duggan Poems

On flowering trees in park where grass is brown
The friar birds call in Queensland mountain Town
The afternoon is hot no puff of breeze
And it must be close to thirty five degrees.
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Thelma know all about life's sadder side
Since her only child Jan in her forties died
But in public places Thelma hide her tears
So noble for one in her twilight years.
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What right have you to judge the man he's done no harm to you
He has not harmed your kids or wife nor beat you black and blue
The man has never done you wrong and yet you put him down
And doubtless if you had your way you'd run him out of town.
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They mostly like to hide from watcher eye
But today around the thicket verge they fly
And utter forth their squeaky warning cry
The white browed scrub wrens have their young nearby.
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Some say that 'twas the environmental damage to his countryside caused the madness of John Clare
That the removal of the mature trees had driven him to despair
Of any hope for Mother Nature and her creatures wild and free
One reason that's put forward for his loss of sanity.
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The polluted World of Suburbia well over an hour's drive away
And out where saltwater is deeper the gannets are diving for prey
The silver gulls mewing on the rooftops and i fancy again i can see
The walking track down to the beach head from that little town by the sea.
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That he was his country's greatest poet so many would agree
And he lived during the famine years and he knew great poverty
And he died in eighteen forty nine just forty six years old
Of malnutrition and consumption or so we have been told.
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Don't talk to me of Heaven or don't talk to me of Hell
I only know the body for the soul is a shell
And the way we appear to others is beyond our control
For an ugly looking person may have a beautiful soul.
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I grew up close to Nature see animals give birth
And i learned just a tiny bit about our Mother Earth
And close to the Goddess of Nature into manhood i did grow
But the more i learn of Nature the less i know i know
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When i was young long years ago and haws were on hawthorn
The boo of threshing machine in farmer's yard when farmer threshed his corn
Some men piked sheafs others built straw ricks, the corn was ripe and yellow
And Jer Noonan fed the threshing drum when i was a young fellow.
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