But What's The Use

But whats the use of writing bush,     Though editors demand it,     For city folk, and farming folk,     Can never understand it.     Theyre blind to what the bushman sees     The best with eyes shut tightest,     Out where the sun is hottest and     The stars are most and brightest.     The crows at sunrise flopping round     Where some poor life has run down;     The pair of emus trotting from     The lonely tank at sundown,     Their snaky heads well up, and eyes     Well out for mans manoeuvres,     And feathers bobbing round behind     Like fringes round improvers.     The swagman tramping cross the plain;     Good Lord, theres nothing sadder,     Except the dog that slopes behind     His master like a shadder;     The turkey-tail to scare the flies,     The water-bag and billy;     The nose-bag getting cruel light,     The traveller getting silly.     The plain that seems to Jackaroos     Like gently sloping rises,     The shrubs and tufts thats miles away     But magnified in sizes;     The track that seems arisen up     Or else seems gently slopin,     And just a hint of kangaroos     Way out across the open.     The joy and hope the swagman feels     Returning, after shearing,     Or after six months tramp Out Back,     He strikes the final clearing.     His weary spirit breathes again,     His aching legs seem limber     When to the East across the plain     He spots the Darling Timber!     But whats the use of writing bush,     Though editors demand it,     For city folk and cockatoos,     They do not understand it.     Theyre blind to what the whaler sees     The best with eyes shut tightest,     Out where Australias widest, and     The stars are most and brightest.