An Epitaph

On a monument formed as a curving wave

By ceaseless waves, that break and waste,
All human record is effaced:
Only our love in brief defence
Shall hold the billow in suspense.

John Le Gay Brereton

John Le Gay Brereton was an Australian poet, critic, and professor of English who was born on September 2, 1871, and died on February 2, 1933. He is best known for his association with the Bulletin school of Australian poetry and for promoting Australian literature. Brereton's contributions to poetry and literary criticism made him a significant figure in early 20th-century Australian literature. His academic career also included a long tenure at the University of Sydney.

John Le Gay Brereton

To My Mother

John Le Gay Brereton, Simple Poetry

Death

John Le Gay Brereton, Simple Poetry

Home

John Le Gay Brereton, Simple Poetry

Rod Quinn

John Le Gay Brereton, Simple Poetry

English

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Vixit

Nurse not your grief, nor make obsequious moan
When I have shed this flesh I love so well,
Nor slowly toll the dull heart-bruising knell,
Nor carve my name in customary stone;
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And my usurious profit who can tell?
Dash tears aside, let joy resume her spell;
Stars glitter where the storm is overblown.
Because I have lived I would not have one say:
Here long ago a man of such a name
Was left to moulder in his pit of clay.
Let only love remember how I came
And built an earthen altar in my day
And lit thereon a comfortable flame.

John Le Gay Brereton

Epitaphs IV. There Never Breathed A Man

There never breathed a man who, when his life
Was closing, might not of that life relate
Toils long and hard. The warrior will report
Of wounds, and bright swords flashing in the field,
And blast of trumpets. He who hath been doomed
To bow his forehead in the courts of kings,
Will tell of fraud and never-ceasing hate,
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Another Epitaph

This little vault, this narrow room,
Of Love and Beauty is the tomb;
The dawning beam, that gan to clear
Our clouded sky, lies darkend here,
For ever set to us: by Death
Sent to enflame the World Beneath.
Twas but a bud, yet did contain
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Elegiac Musings - In The Grounds Of Coleorton Hall, The Seat Of The Late Sir G. H. Beaumont, Bart.

With copious eulogy in prose or rhyme
Graven on the tomb we struggle against Time,
Alas, how feebly! but our feelings rise
And still we struggle when a good man dies:
Such offering Beaumont dreaded and forbade,
A spirit meek in self-abasement clad.
Yet 'here' at least, though few have numbered days
That shunned so modestly the light of praise
His graceful manners, and the temperate ray
Of that arch fancy which would round him play,
Brightening a converse never known to swerve
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The Grey Tide

The cold green rocks and lapping waves
Are all my world as here I sit
With downcast eye and heart that craves
The bush and blue sky over it.

The tide of years is washing by,
The misty water drifts between
A soul with wings that may not fly
And shadowy realms that might have been.

Too late, too late, alas, I know
The track that winds by shining leaves
From where the flood reflects, below,
The greyness of the heart that grieves.

Another yet may tread the way,
And offer at that hidden shrine
His gift of rolled and twisted clay,
And set his lips to holy wine.

Another yet may tinge the flame
Upon that altar blue or red,
And freely call upon Her name,
And taste at will the blessed bread.

The waves are grey about the ...

John Le Gay Brereton

The Clay

When I cast my slough of clay
Put it quietly away.

Let no bloom untimely fade
Where my empty heart is laid.

Ask no folk to crowd around
With an air of woe profound.

Those who love me know that I
Cannot in a coffin lie.

Let them go whereer they will,
Dreaming of me living still.

Let no formal words be said
Customary for the dead.

Plant no stone above the pit:
Let the grass run over it.

John Le Gay Brereton