The Confused Bush Poet

[Dennis N O'Brien]

The Confused Bush Poet

The poet of the bush was quite confused;
This sensitive misguided rural bloke
Had writ, with no intention to provoke,
One night when sentimental, sad and boozed,
A poem that was sure to be refused
An audience by all good country folk,
Who’d think him just another hopeless soak
Whose scribblings just couldn’t be excused.

He’d quite forgotten how he’d stumbled on it.
It wasn’t clever and it wasn’t funny.
It surely wouldn’t make him any money.
It wouldn’t buy the baby a new bonnet.
No droughts or floods and no exploding dunny.
No true blue bushie writes a bloody sonnet!

© Dennis N. O'Brien, 2012

[Stephen Whiteside]

Write what you like, Dennis. That's one of the things I like about C. J. Dennis (the other Dennis). He wore so many hats - bush poet, children's writer, satirist, adept rhymer - he did it all, and he didn't feel obliged to wear any of them for any longer than it suited him (unless there was money in it, of course!). He was also a huge fan of Shakespeare - he of the sonnets.

I don't really think of Paterson and Lawson as 'bush poets', either. They were rhyming poets. and they wrote as much of the city as they did of the bush - and all the places in between too, of course.

Where does the city stop and the bush start? Greg Champion, who lives in Melbourne, reckons anything east of Warrigal Road is the 'bush'. I reckon he's about right.

[Dennis N O'Brien]

Thanks for the comment Stephen. This is really a humourous piece.

I had written it some time ago when I first thought of writing a "bush"
sonnet and with a number of sonnet posts lately I thought it may be a good time to
put it up.

I agree that Lawson and Paterson weren't "Bush" poets although they
certainly were poets of the bush.I'm not sure either would have understood the
term but just considered themselves poets. What I like about them is how
accessible their language is and not doubt that is one reason they were so
successful.

[Neville Briggs]

Henry Kendall ( Bell Birds ) wrote sonnets, he is included in the bush poets by some people.