The Earth Laments for Day

Theres music wafting on the air,
The evening winds are sighing
Among the trees and yonder stream
Is mournfully replying,
Lamenting loud the sunny light
That in the west is dying.

The moon is rising oer the hill,
Her slanting rays are creeping
Where Nature lies profoundly still
In happy quiet sleeping,
And resting on her face, theyll find
The earth is wet with weeping.

She mourneth for the lovely day,
Now deep in darkness shaded;
She sheds the dewy tear because
Of mornings mantle faded;
She misses from her breast the garb
In which the moon arrayd it.

The evening queen will strive in vain
To break the spell which bound her;
A million stars can never throw
Departed warmth around her;
They all must pass away and leave
The earth as they had found her.

But why should gentle Nature weep
That night has overtaken
The wearied world that needed sleep,
Refreshed to re-awaken,
So richer light might burst around,
The gloomy shadows breaking?

Oh, can she not from yonder sky
That gleams above her, borrow
A single ray, or find a way
To check the tear of sorrow?
A beam of hope would last her till
The dawning of to-morrow.

Henry Kendall

Henry Kendall was an Australian poet born on April 18, 1839, known for his lyrical and descriptive poetry reflecting the natural world and the colonial experience of Australia. He faced personal and financial difficulties throughout his life, which deeply influenced his works. His poetry collections include 'Leaves from Australian Forests' and 'Songs from the Mountains'. Kendall passed away on August 1, 1882, leaving a lasting impact on Australian literature.

Henry Kendall

The Austral Months

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The Old Year

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Orara

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Billy Vickers

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English

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Mountains

Rifted mountains, clad with forests, girded round by gleaming pines,
Where the morning, like an angel, robed in golden splendour shines;
Shimmering mountains, throwing downward on the slopes a mazy glare
Where the noonday glory sails through gulfs of calm and glittering air;
Stately mountains, high and hoary, piled with blocks of amber cloud,
Where the fading twilight lingers, when the winds are wailing loud;
Grand old mountains, overbeetling brawling brooks and deep ravines,
Where the moonshine, pale and mournful, flows on rocks and evergreens.

Underneath these regal ridges underneath the gnarly trees,
I am sitting, lonely-hearted, listening to a lonely breeze!
Sitting by an ancient casement, casting many a longing look
Out across the hazy gloaming out beyond the brawling brook...

Henry Kendall

The Merchant Ship

The sun oer the waters was throwing
In the freshness of morning its beams;
And the breast of the ocean seemed glowing
With glittering silvery streams:
A bark in the distance was bounding
Away for the land on her lee;
And the boatswains shrill whistle resounding
Came over and over the sea.
The breezes blew fair and were guiding
Her swiftly along on her track,
And the billows successively passing,
Were lost in the distance aback.
The sailors seemed busy preparing
For anchor to drop ere the night;
The red rusted cables in fathoms
Were hauld from their prisons to light.
Each rope and each brace was attended
By stout-hearted sons of the main,
Whose voices, in unison blended,
Sang many a merry-toned strain.

Forgotten their care and their...

Henry Kendall

Etheline

The heart that once was rich with light,
And happy in your grace,
Now lieth cold beneath the scorn
That gathers on your face;
And every joy it knew before,
And every templed dream,
Is paler than the dying flash
On yonder mountain stream.
The soul, regretting foundered bliss
Amid the wreck of years,
Hath mourned it with intensity
Too deep for human tears!

The forest fadeth underneath
The blast that rushes by
The dripping leaves are white with death,
But Love will never die!
We both have seen the starry moss
That clings where Ruin reigns,
And one must know his lonely breast
Affection still retains;
Through all the sweetest hopes of life,
That clustered round and round,
Are lying now, like withered things,
Forsaken on the ...

Henry Kendall

Sunset

It is better, O day, that you go to your rest,
For you go like a guest who was loth to remain!
Swing open, ye gates of the east and the west,
And let out the wild shadows the night and the rain.

Ye winds, ye are dead, with your voices attuned,
That thrilled the green life in the sweet-scented sheaves,
When I touched a warm hand which has faded, and swooned
To a trance of the darkness, and blight on the leaves.

I had studied the lore in her maiden-like ways,
And the large-hearted love of my Annie was won,
Ere Summer had passed into passionate days,
Or Autumn made ready her fruits for the Sun.

So my life was complete, and the hours that went by,
And the moon and the willow-wooed waters around,
Might have known that we rested, my Annie and I,
In hap...

Henry Kendall

Bells Beyond the Forest

Wild-eyed woodlands, here I rest me, underneath the gaunt and ghastly trees;
Underneath fantastic-fronted caverns crammed with many a muffled breeze.
Far away from dusky towns and cities twinkling with the feet of men;
Listening to a sound of mellow music fleeting down the gusty glen;
Sitting by a rapid torrent, with the broken sunset in my face;
By a rapid, roaring torrent, tumbling through a dark and lonely place!
And I hear the bells beyond the forest, and the voice of distant streams;
And a flood of swelling singing, wafting round a world of ruined dreams.

Like to one who watches daylight dying from a lofty mountain spire,
When the autumn splendour scatters like a gust of faintly-gleaming fire;
So the silent spirit looketh through a mist of faded smiles and tears,
While acro...

Henry Kendall

A Death in the Bush

The hut was built of bark and shrunken slabs,
That wore the marks of many rains, and showed
Dry flaws wherein had crept and nestled rot.
Moreover, round the bases of the bark
Were left the tracks of flying forest fires,
As you may see them on the lower bole
Of every elder of the native woods.

For, ere the early settlers came and stocked
These wilds with sheep and kine, the grasses grew
So that they took the passing pilgrim in
And whelmed him, like a running sea, from sight.

And therefore, through the fiercer summer months,
While all the swamps were rotten; while the flats
Were baked and broken; when the clayey rifts
Yawned wide, half-choked with drifted herbage past,
Spontaneous flames would burst from thence and race
Across the prairies all day lo...

Henry Kendall