Song of the Rain by Hugh McCrae

Night,
and the yellow pleasure of candle-light....
old brown books and the kind, fine face of the clock
fogged in the veils of the fire - it's cuddling tock.

The cat,
greening her eyes on the flame-litten mat;
wickedly, wakeful she yawns at the rain
bending the roses over the pane,
and a bird in my heart begins to sing
over and over the same sweet thing--

Safe in the house with my boyhood's love
and our children asleep in the attic above.

First published in The Lone Hand, 1 January 1913;
and later in
A Book of Australian Verse edited by Judith Wright, 1956;
The Penguin Book of Australian Verse edited by John Thompson, Kenneth Slessor and R.G. Howarth, 1958;
From the Ballads to Brennan edited by T. Inglis Moore, 1964;
Australia's Writers by Graeme Kinross-Smith, 1980;
The Collins Book of Australian Poetry compiled by Rodney Hall, 1980;
The Illustrated Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Beatrice Davis, 1984;
My Country: Australian Poetry and Short Stories, Two Hundred Years edited by Leonie Kramer, 1985;
Peace and War: A Collection of Poems edited by Michael Harrison and Christopher Stuart-Clark, 1989;
The Language of Love: An Anthology of Australian Love Letters, Prose and Poetry edited by Pamela Allardice, 1991; and
The Oxford Book of Australian Love Poems edited by Jennifer Strauss, 1993.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

See also.