AN AUSTRALIAN CHILD When I was a little child My mother said to me, ‘Always call your neighbour By some kind name, you’ll see’; And so, throughout the years— As a child I learned it well ‘O, will you not remember The father, who loved so well The dusky shadows of the gum, The pale-rimmed coast so blue? And all the wild-hearted, wild creatures That wandered out in the dew.’

Then outside on the garden path I played with the wattle flowers, The whispering winds that haunted me
Were friends through all the hours. And when I railed against the fates Like any other child, ‘O, give me in the wilds the hills’ I cried out on the wild.

But every year importance I crowned myself with leaves, For I thought of all my mother’s words, And made me free of griefs; And climb, climb the mountains near, Free as the midst of the wattle trees, And slowly I grew ancient And wandered more at ease.

• Dorothea Mackellar