TO YOU MEN OF THE CITIES
Come! follow me o’er the sun-bleached sands by the seas where the small grog-shanty stands
On the Wallaby track to Falaboo.
Come! drink of the sunsets, rich old wine from the wandering sinful days of mine,
For ’tis only in dreams the world rings true.
Come! dream of some magic, far-off day, some lone backyard in the Milky way!
I’ll fiddle; how the wandering stars will dance!
We’ll sing together—“Yo ho! yo ho!” as on the mighty God-winds blow
Through the dreams of my world of gay romance.
I’ve tramped the tracks to Malabo, I’ve been the way the fallen go!
When times were bad my fiddle wailed their grief—
Till, by the camp-fires on the steep, one by one they fell asleep:
(I’ve buried three, dead in their boots beneath
The breadfruit trees, with all their dreams and Heaven knows what thwarted schemes!)
We’d tramped the cities, then we sought the huts.
And now?—secure on heathen isles, my pals still sport their hopeful smiles:
We’re looking thin on rum and coco-nuts!
So read these pioneer strains of mine, and drink deep, friend, as men do wine,
Of sunsets on the ocean’s foaming rim,
Of far-away and long ago where the scented trade winds blow
Till skylines sigh the stars full to the brim!
As on I tramp through sun-parched days or camp beside the trackless ways,
Here with my fiddle in the jungle curl’d,
Weighed down with wealth!—my tropic seas, my roof of stars above palm trees,
My home the hills and highways of the world!
But—if you men of far-off towns have got a few spare old half-crowns,
Just buy my book, it’s really not the worst
Man ever wrote, but nearly so, and that’s quite near enough, you know;
So, be my friend—and read it “till you burst.”
Part One
SOUTH SEA FOAM
PART ONE