With eyes that are narrowed to pierce <br />To the awful horizons of land, <br />Through the blaze of hot days, and the fierce <br />White heat-waves that flow on the sand; <br />Through the Never Land westward and nor'ward, <br />Bronzed, bearded, and gaunt on the track, <br />Low-voiced and hard-knuckled, rides forward <br />The Christ of the Outer Out-back. <br /> <br />For the cause that will ne'er be relinquished <br />Despite all the cynics on earth--- <br />In the ranks of the bush undistinguished <br />By manner or dress---if by birth; <br />God's preacher, of churches unheeded--- <br />God's vineyard, though barren the sod--- <br />Plain spokesman where spokesman is needed, <br />Rough link 'twixt the bushman and God. <br /> <br />He works where the hearts of a nation <br />Are withered in flame from the sky, <br />Where the sinners work out their salvation <br />In a hell-upon-earth ere they die. <br />In the camp or the lonely hut lying <br />In a waste that seems out of God's sight, <br />He's the doctor---the mate of thee dying <br />Through the smothering heat of the night. <br /> <br />By his work in the hells of the shearers, <br />Where the drinking is ghastly and grim, <br />Where the roughest and worst of his hearers <br />Have listened bareheaded to him; <br />By his paths through the parched desolation, <br />Hot rides, and the long, terrible tramps; <br />By the hunger, the thirst, the privation <br />Of his work in the farthermost camps; <br /> <br />By his worth in the light that shall search men <br />And prove---ay! and justify---each, <br />I place him in front of all churchmen <br />Who feel not, who know not---but preach!<br /><br />Henry Lawson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-christ-of-the-never/
