| Walter Murdoch (1874–1970). The Oxford Book of Australasian Verse. 1918. |
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| 157. The Lonely Woman |
| | | By M. Forrest |
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| WHERE the ironbarks are hanging leaves disconsolate and pale, | |
| Where the wild vines o’er the ranges their spilt cream of blossom trail, | |
| By the door of the bark humpey, by the rotting blood-wood gates, | |
| On the river-bound selection, there a lonely woman waits, | |
| Waits and watches gilded sunrise glow behind the mountain peak, | 5 |
| Hears the water hens’ shrill piping, in the rushes by the creek, | |
| And by the sullen stormy sunsets, when the anxious cattle call, | |
| Sees the everlasting gum-trees closing round her like a wall. | |
| With the hunger of her bosom notes the wild birds seek their mates, | |
| All alone and heavy-hearted, there the lonely woman waits. | 10 |
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| Where the tall brown city buildings loom against a cloud-flecked sky, | |
| Where along the curving tramlines brightly varnished cars rush by, | |
| Where the call of petty traders echoes down the dusty street, | |
| And forever comes the beating of the many passing feet, | |
| Where the bamboo reeds are whispering by the green park’s iron gates, | 15 |
| By the muslin-curtained window, there a lonely woman waits. | |
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| Where the white caps lash the sea-wall, and the great waves thunder by, | |
| Where the grey rains sweep the beaches underneath a sodden sky, | |
| Where the swift-winged gull flies landward, and the fisher bides at home, | |
| When the long Pacific reaches are a seething stretch of foam, | 20 |
| Where the empty boat drifts seawards, by the ocean’s sand-flanked gates, | |
| In the weather-boarded cottage, there a lonely woman waits. | |
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| Where the river boats are calling, where the railway engine shrieks, | |
| Or where only wild bird liltings echo from the reedy creeks, | |
| Where the grey waves grieve to landward, and a wet wind beats the seas, | 25 |
| Or where pearl-white moths flit slowly through the dropping wattle-trees, | |
| By the high verandah pillars, by the rotting bloodwood gates, | |
| Crowded town or dreary seaboard, everywhere some woman waits! | |
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