BirdForum

You will not see vegetable, fruit or grain crops in the big dry country out there
On either side of the road through the outback that could lead you to anywhere
A country of very few people and of very few trees
Where the coolest day in Spring and Summer is well over thirty degrees
A brown scrubby country of few sheep and cattle where the feral camel reside
An unfenced and untameable land of wildness for at least a thousand square kilometres flat and wide
...

Francis Duggan

They sing in the darkness long before daybreak
The Flute of the magpie one cannot mistake
They often wake from their sleep and sing on the moonlit tree
Their notes familiar to many and familiar to me
The Australian magpie is not a corvid but a piping shrike
The black and white bird does not have a look alike
The difference between them and the smaller pied mud nest building bird known as the Pee wee
In song and appearance distinctive as most would...

Francis Duggan

The bird does not sing for the joys of the Spring
With him song is a territorial thing
The neighbour male bird of his kind know by the tone of his voice
That to venture inside his borders would not be a good choice
Since he know that to do so that feathers would fly
In the bird world as in the human World there are laws to live by
And at nesting time male birds their borders defend
When amongst males of their own kind they do not have a friend...

Francis Duggan

Of my worth as a rhymer i have reason to doubt
And few interested enough in to read any of the things i have written about
Such as the pink spots on the skin of the wildborn brown trout
On the bed of the clear river pool when the sun is out
Or the beautiful song the gray butcherbird sing
In the World of Birds quite a distinctive thing
Or the homeless one who daydreams of becoming a billionaire
It goes without saying that his type are not rare
...

Francis Duggan

I am from the place where the Cails waters flow
The home to the badger and silver back crow
I left there to move south twenty four years ago
With Clara in his hat of December snow
The old hill that overlooks high Claramore
Far north even as the migratory birds fly from this southern shore
I may even seem a stranger in the Claraghatlea of today
Who is that old fellow many there of me might say
It has been many years since i heard a mother cow...

Francis Duggan