The Lakes of Connewarre

(Koonwarra, the black swan)

Across the sleeping lake the salty breath

Of ocean, beading the moisture on the bough,

Breathing and blowing the sea-fog to and fro,

Dies on the silver marsh in one long slow

Sigh, and the watery waste is still as death,

And very silent now.

Once, once the beating of a thousand wings

Smote up the answering echoes to the sun;

A thousand feathered craft, from shore to shore,

Afloat, the scintillating waters bore.

But Time has made a mock of many things,

And all these things are gone.

And so, where old primeval nature's grave is,

And all those teeming myriads had their day,

Where the dark huntsmen pitched their wandering camps,

The English briar-rose hangs her pinky lamps,

The English skylarks shrill their silver Aves

Beside Corio Bay.

A bolt of sunlight parts the sullen wreath

Of fog, the floating draperies darting through.

Caught in the shining net the sunlight wrought her,

A million diamonds deck the latticed water,

And all the world is beautiful beneath

The deep Australian blue. . . .

A lonely band across the sunset's rose

Flying swiftly, and the leader's haunting call.

The clouds have made the lake their looking-glass,

The summer day has passed, as all things pass,

Slow drawing to a melancholy close

With darkness for a pall.

Kathleen Dalziel

CALENDARS

The dust-grain is an embryo of stars,

And stars are future grains of dust, for time

Is not. The senses feel the changes prime