The Singing Garden

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The Singing Garden

CONTENTS

SPRING

• Dawn (Verse)
• The Way of the Vandal
• Forest Sanctuary (Verse)
• Green Walls (Verse)
• Morning Glory (Verse)
• Blandishing the Birds
• Songs of Bush Birds
• The Wedge-tailed Eagle
• The Coachwhip Bird
• The Welcome Swallow
• The Wattle Bird
• The Eastern Shrike-tit
• The Spinebill Honeyeater
• The Flame-breasted Robin
• The Firetail Finches
• The Pallid Cuckoo
• The English Blackbird
• The Bronze Cuckoo
• The King Parrot
• The Tawny Frogmouth

SUMMER

• Summer (Verse)
• This Lonely Forest
• North Wind (Verse)
• Heat Wave (Verse)
• Recuperation
• Songs of Bush Birds
• The Grey Thrush
• The Rufous Fantail
• The Scrub Wren
• The Kookaburra
• The English Goldfinch
• The Grey Goshawk
• The Grey Fantail
• The Little Black Cormorant
• The Golden Whistler
• The Treecreeper
• The Gang Gang
• The Singing Honeyeater
• The Boobook Owl
• The Lyretail
• The Black and White Fantail
• The Dusky Wood-swallow

AUTUMN

• Autumn (Verse)
• The Kookaburra Murder Case
• Indian Summer (Verse)
• First Frost (Verse)
• The Case of Long John Silver
• Songs of Bush Birds
• The Magpie Lark
• The Silver-eye
• The Crimson Parrot
• The White Cockatoo
• The Butcher Bird
• The Blue Kingfisher
• The Ground Thrush
• The Sparrow
• Starlings
• The Indian Myna
• The Yellow-tailed Thornbill
• The Wonga Pigeon

WINTER

• Winter (Verse)
• Birdland on the Dole
• The Tree (Verse)
• The Besting of Bombastes
• Songs of Bush Birds
• The Blue Wren
• Currawong, Pied
• The Black Cockatoo
• The Satin Bower Bird
• The Bronzewing Pigeon
• The Crow (Australian Raven)
• The Yellow Robin
• The Pink-breasted Robin
• The Magpie
• Epilogue
• Promise of Spring (Verse)
• The Quiet Hour
• Dusk (Verse)

North Wind     -     by CJ Dennis

DAWN came this morning ominous and grim.
The circle of the sun rose bloated where,
Seen thro' the scudding cloud, its angry rim
Burned dull and copper hued--a sullen glare.
The stale and lifeless air
Made no least little stir 'mid leaf and limb
Of great trees brooding round this garden trim;
A listening fear seemed there.

Listening and waiting. Then a far, faint roar
Spread from the furthest hills. A sudden breeze,
Swelling in volume, thro' the forest tore
Until it seemed the tossing, tortured trees
Writhed in fierce agonies.
The crashing trunks sounded as guns in war,
And tumult reigned, as of some rock-bound shore
Defying angry seas.

Waning to wax again with gathered power,
All day it raged, and leapt from hill to hill,
Shouting its wrath . . . Now, with a healing shower,
Quiet comes down, and all seems strangely still.
The wind has had its will
With riven loveliness of shrub and flower;
But round the ruin storm-scarred monarchs tower
Unconquerable still.

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