March 17 by Victor J. Daley

If I could keep a garden fair,
   Red poppies there would be;
No tragic bloom would whisper there --
   "Dost thou remember me?"

She walked the lonans long between,
   And lightly laughed at me.
Her head was draped in Irish green,
   Her limbs in cramoisie.

She held two roses in one hand
   (A sword swung to her knee),
The Scarlet Rose of Valor and
   The Rose of Purity.

She said -- "When I am rich, my Sweet,
   As I shall always be,
Three States shall march down Sackville-street,
   And I the first of Three."

First published in The Bulletin, 17 March 1904

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library

See also.