'Tis a legend of the bushmen from the days of Cunningham, <br />When he opened up the country and the early squatters came. <br />Tis the old tale of a fortune missed by men who did seek, <br />And, perhaps, you haven’t heard it—The Brass Well on Myall Creek. <br />They were north of running rivers, they were south of Queensland rains, <br />And a blazing drought was scorching every grass-blade from the plains; <br />So the stockmen drove the cattle to the range where there was grass, <br />And a couple sunk a well and found what they believed was brass. <br /> <br />‘Here’s some bloomin’ brass!’ they muttered when they found it in the clay, <br />And they thought no more about it and in time they went away; <br />But they heard of gold, and saw it, somewhere down by Inverell, <br />And they felt and weighed it, crying: ‘Why! we found it in the well!’ <br /> <br />And they worked about the station and at times they took the track, <br />Always meaning to save money, always meaning to go back— <br />‘Always meanin’,’ like the bushmen, who go drifting round like wrecks, <br />And they’d get half way to Myall, strike a pub and blew their cheques. <br /> <br />Then they told two more about it and those other two grew old, <br />And they never found the brass well and they never found the gold. <br />For the scrub grows dense and quickly and, though many went to seek, <br />No one ever struck the lost track to the Well on Myall Creek. <br /> <br />And the story is forgotten and I’m sitting here, alas! <br />With a woeful load of trouble and a woeful lack of brass; <br />But I dream at times that I might find what many went to seek, <br />And my luck might lead my footsteps to the Well at Myall Creek.<br /><br />Henry Lawson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-brass-well/
