Mary Gilmore–Old Botany Bay

Inevitable really, given my convict ancestor Jacob Whitfield has appeared here so often in recent days. Yes, he was for a time in an iron gang…

Old Botany Bay

I’m old
Botany Bay;
Stiff in the joints,
Little to say. 

I am he
Who paved the way,
That you might walk
At your ease to-day; 

I was the conscript
Sent to hell
To make in the desert
The living well; 

I bore the heat,
I blazed the track –
Furrowed and bloody
Upon my back. 

I split the rock;
I felled the tree:
The nation was-
Because of me!” 

Old Botany Bay
Taking the sun
from day to day…
shame on the mouth
that would deny
the knotted hands
that set us high!