# To Be Amused

Written in 1906.
    You ask me to be gay and glad
    While lurid clouds of danger loom,
    And vain and bad and gambling mad,
    Australia races to her doom.
    You bid me sing the light and fair,
    The dance, the glance on pleasure's wings -
    While you have wives who will not bear,
    And beer to drown the fear of things.
    A war with reason you would wage
    To be amused for your short span,
    Until your children's heritage
    Is claimed for China by Japan.
    The football match, the cricket score,
    The "scraps", the tote, the mad'ning Cup -
    You drunken fools that evermore
    "To-morrow morning" sober up!
    I see again with haggard eyes,
    The thirsty land, the wasted flood;
    Unpeopled plains beyond the skies,
    And precious streams that run to mud;
    The ruined health, the wasted wealth,
    In our mad cities by the seas,
    The black race suicide by stealth,
    The starved and murdered industries!
    You bid me make a farce of day,
    And make a mockery of death;
    While not five thousand miles away
    The yellow millions pant for breath!
    But heed me now, nor ask me this -
    Lest you too late should wake to find
    That hopeless patriotism is
    The strongest passion in mankind!
    You'd think the seer sees, perhaps,
    While staring on from days like these,
    Politeness in the conquering Japs,
    Or mercy in the banned Chinese!
    I mind the days when parents stood,
    And spake no word, while children ran
    From Christian lanes and deemed it good
    To stone a helpless Chinaman.
    I see the stricken city fall,
    The fathers murdered at their doors,
    The sack, the massacre of all
    Save healthy slaves and paramours -
    The wounded hero at the stake,
    The pure girl to the leper's kiss -
    God, give us faith, for Christ's own sake
    To kill our womankind ere this.
    I see the Bushman from Out Back,
    From mountain range and rolling downs,
    And carts race on each rough bush track
    With food and rifles from the towns;
    I see my Bushmen fight and die
    Amongst the torn blood-spattered trees,
    And hear all night the wounded cry
    For men! More men and batteries!
    I see the brown and yellow rule
    The southern lands and southern waves,
    White children in the heathen school,
    And black and white together slaves;
    I see the colour-line so drawn
    (I see it plain and speak I must),
    That our brown masters of the dawn
    Might, aye, have fair girls for their lusts!
    With land and life and race at stake -
    No matter which race wronged, or how -
    Let all and one Australia make
    A superhuman effort now.
    Clear out the blasting parasites,
    The paid-for-one-thing manifold,
    And curb the goggled "social-lights"
    That "scorch" to nowhere with our gold.
    Store guns and ammunition first,
    Build forts and warlike factories,
    Sink bores and tanks where drought is worst,
    Give over time to industries.
    The outpost of the white man's race,
    Where next his flag shall be unfurled,
    Make clean the place! Make strong the place!
    Call white men in from all the world!
This work is in the public domain in Australia because it was created in Australia and the term of copyright has expired. According to Australian Copyright Council - Duration of Copyright, the following works are public domain:
* published non-government works whose author died before January 1, 1955,
* anonymous or pseudonymous works and photographs published before January 1, 1955, and
* government works published more than 50 years ago (before January 1, 1974).
This work is also in the public domain in the United States because it was first published outside the United States (and not published in the U.S. within 30 days), and it was first published before 1989 without complying with U.S. copyright formalities (renewal and/or copyright notice) and it was in the public domain in Australia on the URAA date (January 1, 1996). This is the combined effect of Australia having joined the Berne Convention in 1928, and of 17 USC 104A with its critical date of January 1, 1996.
Because the Australian copyright term in 1996 was 50 years, the critical date for copyright in the United States under the URAA is January 1, 1946.
This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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