Above Crows Nest - Sydney

A blanket low and leaden,     Though rent across the west,     Whose darkness seems to deaden     The brightest and the best;     A sunset white and staring     On cloud-wrecks far away,     And haggard house-walls glaring     A farewell to the day.     A light on tower and steeple,     Where sun no longer shines,     My people, Oh my people!     Rise up and read the signs!     Low looms the nearer high-line     (No sign of star or moon),     The horseman on the skyline     Rode hard this afternoon!     (Is he, and who shall know it?,     The spectre of a scout?     The spirit of a poet,     Whose truths were met with doubt?     Who sought and who succeeded     In marking dangers track,     Whose warnings were unheeded     Till all the sky was black?)     It is a shameful story     For our young, generous home,     Without the rise and glory     Wed go as Greece and Rome.     Without the sacrifices     That make a nations name,     The elder nations vices     And luxuries we claim.     Grown vain without a conquest,     And sure without a fort,     And maddened in the one quest     For pleasure or for sport.     Self-blinded to our starkness     Wed fling the time away     To fight, half-armed, in darkness     Who should be armed to-day.     This song is for the city,     The city in its pride,     The coming time shall pity     And shield the countryside.     Shall we live in the present     Till fearful war-clouds loom,     And till the sullen peasant     Shall leave us to our doom?     Cloud-fortresses titanic     Along the western sky,     The tired, bowed mechanic     And pallid clerk flit by.     Lit by a light unhealthy,     The ghastly after-glare,     The veiled and goggled wealthy     Drive fast, they know not where.     Nights sullen spirit rouses,     The darkening gables lour     From ugly four-roomed houses     Verandahd windows glower;     The last long day-stare dies on     The scrub-ridged western side,     And round the near horizon     The spectral horsemen ride.