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laine | all galleries >> Australia's Eastern States >> new_south_wales > Gunnedah NSW ~ Avenue of Honour to Dorothea Mackellar
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14-OCT-2015

Gunnedah NSW ~ Avenue of Honour to Dorothea Mackellar

Gunnedah, NSW. This line of trees are planted in honour of poet, Dorothea MacKellar who was inspired
by the area to write her famous poem

My Country
The love of field and coppice,
Of green and shaded lanes.
Of ordered woods and gardens
Is running in your veins,
Strong love of grey-blue distance
Brown streams and soft dim skies
I know but cannot share it,
My love is otherwise.

I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror -
The wide brown land for me!

A stark white ring-barked forest
All tragic to the moon,
The sapphire-misted mountains,
The hot gold hush of noon.
Green tangle of the brushes,
Where lithe lianas coil,
And orchids deck the tree-tops
And ferns the warm dark soil.

Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When sick at heart, around us,
We see the cattle die -
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady, soaking rain.

Core of my heart, my country!
Land of the Rainbow Gold,
For flood and fire and famine,
She pays us back threefold -
Over the thirsty paddocks,
Watch, after many days,
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze.

An opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land -
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand -
Though earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.

Dorothea Mackellar

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Frank Brault17-Oct-2015 00:54
Lovely. V
Janet Donnelly16-Oct-2015 17:27
Lovely view! (but to me, you're driving on the wrong side of the road ..LOL)
Zoltán Balogh16-Oct-2015 12:45
Very nice composition! V
bill friedlander16-Oct-2015 01:35
A lovely tribute to the poet, and a wonderful poem. V
Jeff Real15-Oct-2015 22:59
This is the next best thing to going on a drive...I love it! ~V~
Colin Storey15-Oct-2015 17:06
Wonderful image and poem.
Stephanie15-Oct-2015 11:17
Lovely leading of the eye!
Yvonne15-Oct-2015 10:06
Love that poem... and what a wonderful scene to accompany it!
marie-jose wolff15-Oct-2015 10:00
great perspective! V
Johnny JAG14-Oct-2015 20:08
Great lines
joseantonio14-Oct-2015 19:08
such a lovely perspective...V
hamery14-Oct-2015 18:51
Wonderful lines of tree and becoming even dramatic after reading the poem, Laine. Nice and clever presentation ! BV
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