The Thread of Life

On the North Western Plain in dust and shimmering Heat
Where wild cattle bellow and lambs with mothers bleat.
Where the eerie mirage beckons lost men to their doom.
And to those who do not know naught but place of gloom.
To most who have once tasted life on those vast wide spaces.
A mystic call come back; come back! To were the emu paces
With stately, tread, head held erect and large shiny eye
Were the lonely turkey lives and you hear the Brolga cry.
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We see him on the far stretched plains dog trotting by his side
His horse may be an outlaw or may be quiet to ride.
Perhaps his thoughts are doleful or perhaps they are quite sad.
If dust and flies are pestering and mosquitoes very bad
Perhaps his heart is singing if the days sublime.
As we know it can be in that nor-western clime
When the grass is waving stock all fat and sleek
Water good and plentiful down in the Grahwin creek.
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Seasons come and go some good some bad some splendid
A sudden change to another sphere, and that phase of life is ended.
A ceaseless lapping of waves as they caress the coral shore.
Humidity making moisture ooze from every pore
But with cool pith helmet and clean, white, duck drill suit
The niggers do the work whilst he regales himself on fruit.
Tropical growth on every hand vines clinging to the trees
Stately palms with graceful fronds waving in the brease.
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And this from hard baked clay pans gidgee and tough boree.
To mushy tropic island surounded by the sea.
So step by step, by day the thread of life he weaves
Some gay and joyful sometimes he's sad and grieves.
We can trace his childish footsteps in the mountain snow
Then in the glittering City when youth was all aglow.
Young manhood in open spaces, where silence raigns supreme.
To vast Pacific's coral isles where life seems but a dream.
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But life is very earnest where ever we may be.
And fate deals out awkard hands to play; to that; you'll all agree
Now may the weel of fortune prosper and help the lad
And bring him back in safety to his waiting mum and dad.

                                                   By Walter Witts 15/7/1934