No man's step on the threshold, nor voice of him returning,
Bar out the fear, the shadow -- thus lonely nights have taught her.
Oh, see the cradle rocking, and smell the drift fire burning,
And hear a woman singing the song of the grey water.
Not when in rifted saffron, the prisoned day is breaking,
Behind the eastward ranges, a winter dawning cold,
And fretted channel water foretells the wind awaking,
Not when the mists are winding across the morning gold.
Not when, with sleep-dipped fingers, her chain of silence linking,
The still sea for her mirror, slow slides the listening noon,
With lazy weeds awashing, and long green drinking,
The sleepy shadows slipping beneath the leaves aswoon.
Not when with she-oaks droning like task-tired children singing,
And shoreward steals a sea wind, brine gathered, blowing cool,
Not when, from leafy vantage, blue pinioned, potent, flinging,
Amongst the shoaling silver death darts upon the pool.
But when the dry bark rustles along the forest dying,
Through scarfed and peeling branches the night winds sough and fret.
Oh, leagues of lonely water, grey leagues beyond you living.
What is it you have taken in years that I forget?
The voice of wind and water, like step and stumbling start is,
And voices hushed and humbled, of those that bear the dead.
The fear of grey water in every woman's heart is,
As one that hath a treasure, and wakes at night for dread.
No man's step on the threshold, nor voice of him returning.
Bar out the fear, the shadow -- thus lonely nights have taught her.
Oh, see the cradle rocking, and smell the drift fire burning,
And hear a woman singing the song of the grey water.
First published in The Sydney Mail, 12 July 1911;
and later in
Outland Born and Other Verses by Ella McFadyen, 1911
Author reference site: Austlit
See also.
Bar out the fear, the shadow -- thus lonely nights have taught her.
Oh, see the cradle rocking, and smell the drift fire burning,
And hear a woman singing the song of the grey water.
Not when in rifted saffron, the prisoned day is breaking,
Behind the eastward ranges, a winter dawning cold,
And fretted channel water foretells the wind awaking,
Not when the mists are winding across the morning gold.
Not when, with sleep-dipped fingers, her chain of silence linking,
The still sea for her mirror, slow slides the listening noon,
With lazy weeds awashing, and long green drinking,
The sleepy shadows slipping beneath the leaves aswoon.
Not when with she-oaks droning like task-tired children singing,
And shoreward steals a sea wind, brine gathered, blowing cool,
Not when, from leafy vantage, blue pinioned, potent, flinging,
Amongst the shoaling silver death darts upon the pool.
But when the dry bark rustles along the forest dying,
Through scarfed and peeling branches the night winds sough and fret.
Oh, leagues of lonely water, grey leagues beyond you living.
What is it you have taken in years that I forget?
The voice of wind and water, like step and stumbling start is,
And voices hushed and humbled, of those that bear the dead.
The fear of grey water in every woman's heart is,
As one that hath a treasure, and wakes at night for dread.
No man's step on the threshold, nor voice of him returning.
Bar out the fear, the shadow -- thus lonely nights have taught her.
Oh, see the cradle rocking, and smell the drift fire burning,
And hear a woman singing the song of the grey water.
First published in The Sydney Mail, 12 July 1911;
and later in
Outland Born and Other Verses by Ella McFadyen, 1911
Author reference site: Austlit
See also.
