It’s Poetry Friday. Last week I shared Dorothea Mackellar’s famous ‘My Country’ and it had such a lovely response that I thought I might share another classic Australian poem this week.
This one is perhaps less well known. It’s a ballad, by a Scottish-born Australian poem Mary Hannay-Foott. It’s a little haunting, but one I’m very fond of – enough that I included it in my Teaching Poetry book.
Where the Pelican Builds Her Nest
The horses were ready, the rails were down,
But the riders lingered still
One had a parting word to say,
And one had his pipe to fill.
Then they mounted, one with a granted prayer,
And one with a grief unguessed.
“We are going,” they said, as they rode away
“Where the Pelican builds her nest!”
They had told us of pastures wide and green,
To be sought past the sunset’s glow;
Of rifts in the ranges by opal lit;
And gold ‘neath the river’s flow.
And thirst and hunger were banished words
When they spoke of that unknown West;
No drought they dreaded, no flood they feared,
Where the pelican builds her nest!
The creek at the ford was but fetlock deep
When we watched them crossing there;
The rains have replenished it thrice since then,
And thrice has the rock lain bare.
But the waters of Hope have flowed and fled,
And never from blue hill’s breast
Come back – by the sun and the sands devoured
Where the pelican builds her nest!
Mary Hannay-Foott (1881)
That last stanza is a wee bit heart breaking, and I believe that the poem was written about two brothers who went off searching for fertile farming land (the pelicans build nests where there is water and food) and never returned. There is more about the poem here.
Coincidentally, I shared earlier this week, a lesson idea for guiding students to write sad poems. It is only as I write this post that I realise this poem is a really good example.
I’m off today to a small literary festival not far from home, so I’ll be checking in on the rest of the Poetry Friday fun a little later. Heidi will be hosting the roundup. Have a great Friday!
Lots of other stuff happened in 2022. I worked hard, spent time with my husband, children and grandchildren, and with friends and extended family. I swam (not as much as I’d like, but enough to keep moving), walked on the beach and welcomed my gorgeous new puppy (George) into my life. I wrote – including finishing a verse novel and having it accepted, and also finalising work on a previous one – meaning I have one coming out in June this year, and another early in 2024. I spoke at festivals and at schools and other events. I read lots of wonderful books. We had a wedding in the family and, like every family, lots of highs and lows/challenges.
Tell Me Lies
