Archibald Thomas Strong: Verses about Weather

The Sunlight laughs along the serried stone
About whose feet the wastrel tide runs free;
Light lie the shipmasts, fairy-like to see,
Athwart the royal city’s splendour thrown;
On runs the noble river, wide and lone,
Like some great soul that presses to the sea
Where life is rendered to eternity
And eager thought hath rest in the Unknown.

So sets thy tide, my country, to the deep
Whose face is black with thunder near and far,
And vexed with fleering gusts and tyrannous rain.
Shall the cloud lift and give thee rest and sleep,
Or wilt thou ’mid the surge and crash of war
Shatter thy life against the invading main?

Gallant is Spring along thy laughing hills,
With wattle’s loveliest scent and gleam of gold,
When the good rain hath quickened all thy mould,
And the hot musk thine air with incense fills.
Sweet is the chime of all thy tinkling rills,
And fair thy Summer’s glory to behold,
And soft is life for thee, the sunny-souled,
Far from the world and all its olden ills.

Yet ’tis not calm that builds the hero breed,
High hearts are tempered ’neath a stormy star,
Through want and danger doth the soul increase,
Stern rings the clarion voice of Angel Need
To bid thee vanquish self, and gaze afar
And save thy soul alive from Harlot Peace.