To My Mother

Once more the Christian festival is near,
And I, for whom each day repeats all days
Continuously in ecstasy of praise,
Loves birthday lasting through the unending year,
Am dreaming how the spirit draws me sheer
From farthest wandering in the illusive maze
To that white centre whose creative blaze
Spun me aloft and sets me tremulous here.
And since all heaven is figured in my heart,
As in a dewdrop ere it change and live
There shines the glory of the eternal dome,
Mother, to you the showering meteors dart
Of free affection, fancies fugitive,
And flare, with increasing heat and splendour, home.

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

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John Le Gay Brereton, Simple Poetry

English

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To My Mother

No foreign tribute from a stranger-hand,
Mother, I bring thee, whom not Heaven's songs
Would as an alien reach.... Ah, but how far
From Heaven's least heavenly is the changing note
And changing fancy of these fitful cries!
Mother, forgive them, as the best of me
Has ever pleaded only for thy pardon,
Not for thy praise.
Mother, there is a love
Men give to wives and children, lovers, friends;
There is a love which some men give to God.
Ah! between this, I think, and that last love,
Last and too-late-discovered love of God,
There shines--and nearer to the love of God--
The love a man gives only to his mother,
Whose travail of dear thought has never end
Until the End. Oh that my mouth had words
Comfortable as thy kisses to the boy
Who loved while he forg...

John Frederick Freeman

Middle Harbour

Lonely wonder, delight past hoping!
Sky-line broken by stirring trees,
Grey rocks hither and shoreward sloping,
Silent bracken about my knees.

Dusky scrub where the sunlight splashes,
Glimmer of waters barely seen
Here the hope that was dust and ashes
Leaps and flashes in flames of green.

Through the boughs that are still before me,
Misty blue of the harbour hills;
Mighty Spirit of Earth who bore me,
Here the peace of thy love distils.

Fools have harried me; hell has driven,
Bidding me toil for its fading shows:
Back I spring to your arms, forgiven,
Back to the truth that a dreamer knows.

Gold and glory and fleeting pleasure
Pass in dust or as melting cloud:
You can dower with eternal treasure
Heart uplifted and head unbo...

John Le Gay Brereton

Centennial.

A hundred times the bells of Brown
    Have rung to sleep the idle summers,
And still to-day clangs clamouring down
    A greeting to the welcome comers.

And far, like waves of morning, pours
    Her call, in airy ripples breaking,
And wanders to the farthest shores,
    Her children's drowsy hearts awaking.

The wild vibration floats along,
    O'er heart-strings tense its magic plying,
And wakes in every breast its song
    Of love and gratitude undying.

My heart to meet the summons leaps
    At limit of its straining tether,
Where the fresh western sunlight steeps
    In golden flame the prairie heather.

And others, happier, rise and fare
    To pass within the hallowed portal,
And see the glory shining there
    Shrine...

John Hay

Ad Matrem Dolorosam

    Think not thy little fountain's rain
        That in the sunlight rose and flashed,
    From the bright sky has fallen again,
        To cold and shadowy silence dashed.
    The Joy that in her radiance leapt
    From everlasting hath not slept.

    The hand that to thy hand was dear,
        The untroubled eyes that mirrored thine,
    The voice that gave thy soul to hear
        A whisper of the Love Divine--
    What though the gold was mixed with dust?
    The gold is thine and cannot rust.

    Nor fear, because thy darling's heart
        No longer beats with mortal life,
    That she has missed the ennobling part
        Of human growth and human strife.
    Only she has the eternal peace
    Wherein to reap the soul's increase.

Henry John Newbolt

The Mother's Return

A month, sweet Little-ones, is past
Since your dear Mother went away,,
And she tomorrow will return;
Tomorrow is the happy day.

O blessed tidings! thought of joy!
The eldest heard with steady glee;
Silent he stood; then laughed amain,,
And shouted, " Mother, come to me!"

Louder and louder did he shout,
With witless hope to bring her near;
"Nay, patience! patience, little boy!
Your tender mother cannot hear."

I told of hills, and far-off town,
And long, long vale to travel through;,
He listens, puzzled, sore perplexed,
But he submits; what can he do ?

No strife disturbs his sister's breast;
She wars not with the mystery
Of time and distance, night and day;
The bonds of our humanity.

Her joy is like an instinct, ...

William Wordsworth

Hesper

Not till the sun, that brings to birth
The myriad marvels of the earth
And bids us look with wandering eyes
On all that here about us lies,
Has gone behind the hill,
Do you, O peaceful evening star,
Gaze on the dusk in which we are
And draw the heart of hope and love
To infinite deep on deep above
And bid our care be still.

All glorious pleasures of the day,
When every sense may have its way
And thought may touch the tiniest fact
And gauge the motive and the act
And measure our delight,
Depart, and leave us to the quest
Of quiet solitude and rest
And knowledge that the plotting brain
With all its science cannot gain
But from the soul of Night.

John Le Gay Brereton