ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

Gondwanaland ... © Maureen Clifford The #ScribblyBark Poet

There's an eye in the sky and it's watching below
as the cluster of cloud seems to thicken and grow
and the predictions out - it's a bloody big blow
job below - 'neath the cloud hiding Queensland.

Well she came and she went - causing grief and torment
to the people who faced her - all pleased when she went
but it's hard to believe to just what an extent
she has damaged our country - our dreamland.

The mud army came out, to fight with mop and broom
indomitable spirits who would not give up soon
and disaster relief will help folks to resume
normalcy, in both city and farmland.

Debbie has ruined homes, and decimated trees,
she has flooded the pastures and cities with ease
and her stench is now tainting every errant breeze -
her rip roaring creating a wasteland.

Right from central Queensland down to New South Wales
this dastardly female has left folks with tales
they'll be telling for years, detailing the travails
of folks battered not broke by this harsh land.

It takes more than a cyclone to bring us undone -
we've fought flood before, and bushfire and we've won ...
it's a bloody harsh country we have 'neath the sun
but we love her - she's ours - she's our homeland.

And it's moments like this that makes our nation strong
when all men band together, when all get along
and just pitch in and help as a united throng
of Aussies who adversity withstand.

Maureen, I like your innovative AAAB CCCB etc rhyme style - good to try something different, isn't it?

I don't know if you intended the rhyme across the first three lines of each verse to mirror the repeated and relentless onslaught of the cyclone - but it works well that way. Then the repeated rhyme on the last line of each consecutive verse reinforces the Aussie sense of determination to rise again and not be overcome by the pounding (or that's how it comes across to me, anyway!)

Cheers
Shelley

Thank you Shelley