And set a standard unsurpassed,
a prestige that would never cease
Now some are grey and old
and others have passed by
Bataan’s deeds will still be told —
the plaque will never die.
Herbert M. Boys
* * *
The Men of Yesterday
Along our coasts the cannons roar, our towns are all alight.
And drums they roll and bells they peal to call the men to fight.
But where are the men all trained for war their country to defend;
We have the men, but all untrained, it would be fatal these to send?
From country farm and city street, with hair that’s turning grey,
They form once more in steady ranks, the Men of Yesterday.
As they march their thoughts go back to battles long ago,
As side by side with comrades old, they face a nearer foe,
And bursting shell and battle dust block out the light of day,
For grimly fight and grimly die, the Men of Yesterday.
And quicker still the reaper swings and each sweep a full swathe takes
As the foe with deadly fire, those thinning ranks he rakes;
And wider grows those widening gaps, before that hail of lead,
Till few are left to face the foe besides the dying and the dead.
But now is heard the tramp of feet in the lull of battle sound,
And dying men their rifles grasp to fire a final round.
On they come that marching host and charge into the fray,
And through those shattered ranks they pour, the Young Men of Today.
Rank on rank their still forms lie with faces cold and grey,
No more they’ll hear the glad larks sing or see the break of day;
Behind those lines the women sing and children are at play,
And perhaps at times they give a thought to the Men of Yesterday.
G. S. Laslett,
OB Flat, 1940
* * *
Friendship
Friendship is the golden chain
That nought on earth can sever,
The passing years roll on in vain
True friends are friends forever.
Anon
* * *
Reflections
Let our thoughts go back to the Unit’s birth,
Of the time that has passed since then;
Of the heroic deeds that have proved our worth,
And shown us as fighting men.
Let us dwell for a time on the present day,
With its trials and hardships so real,
Of the various setbacks that come our way
Which we tackle with courage and zeal.
Let us look to the future with confident mien,
To the battles that yet must be fought,
With courage and team work the world has not seen —
We’ll prove we weren’t formed for nought!
G. H. B.
* * *
Here Again
Your name is here again,
Resting quietly in the trees,
With the flame trees and the brush box
And the tiny native bees,
With the grey gum and the iron bark
And whispering Bribie pine,
The crows ash and the black bean,
Silky oak and turpentine.
Magpies calling in the morning-
Butcher birds and curlew fly.
Lilly-pilly’s soft pink colours-
Bloodwood reaching to the sky.
The flagpole stands and watches.
May the trees grow straight and tall
And the sheoaks murmur softly:
“Thanks for answering the call.”
Margaret Gibbons
* * *
Glimpse
Hold on to freedom despite the price it costs,
Take heart in your failures, despite all you have lost.
Hold out for memories of the times spent in the past —
Close your eyes and wish for me, I’m coming home at last.
Tired bones and weary legs have travelled me so far,
But strike the light on the old front porch and leave the door ajar.
These legs have still some miles to roam,
Today I’m coming home.
I feel just like my father was looking from a distance,
Stretching out to bridge the gap, but I always find resistance.
To only hear your voice so sweet from the end of a telephone line,
It echoes in this broken heart, and pleads to turn back time.
To carefully rearrange the photos as time ages your face,
To carefully construct the albums to ensure you’re not erased,
To have to ask for details which should never be forgot,
To justify the guilty thoughts and lie that I have not.
To wrestle with emotions and fight back salty tears,
The flood of these emotions which signify the years.
These years are ones of fulfilled dreams, but darkened with regret,
Of a selfish motivated man with promises not kept.
I long for days of undue stress, a time when I’ll retreat,
A time when family surrounds me and life seems so complete
When I can make amends for all the years I’ve been away —
Leave that candle burning please, I won’t be home today.
Pte J. Harris
19 May 1998
* * *
Sad Song Calling
There’s something about that sad sound,
That haunting sound when they play The last Post
You can feel something deep in your soul
As tho’ you’ve been touched by a ghost.
Yeah, there’s something about that sound,
Close your eyes and you’re drifting away
And without really knowing just how
You are standing on Suvla Bay.
And around you there’s the Dead and the Dying
Lonely shapes of the victims of War
And you suddenly find yourself crying
As you hear that sad bugle once more.
’Tis a song that was born of a sadness,
’Tis a song we too often repeat
As we call to all those who’ve departed
When old soldiers and memories meet.
It’s a sound that drifts over the trenches
And it weaves thru’ the tall jungle trees
And it whispers “Sometimes we are beaten
But we’ll never be brought to our knees.”
For the song touches all with a spirit
And reminds us how fragile we are,
And while our minds may feel memory’s wounds
It’s the heart where we’re bearing the scar.
That song is the sound of the Fallen
And the wind blows it ’cross foreign lands
From Milne Bay to the green fields of Flanders
To the dust of El Alamein sands
And the wind takes it ‘cross seas and oceans
To the places wherever men fell,
And caresses the ghosts who are resting
And its song touches all those as well.
And the sound follows trails they have trodden
Calling those that the jungles retain
Waking Sandakan Death Marchers, sleeping,
Then returns home to those who remain.
And for those who still march every April
It will call to their spirits as well
And for those who stand watching, and wondering
Touch their hearts with the stories you tell
Leave the gaps in your ranks when you’re marching
They’ll be filled, tho’ they see no one there
Play The Last Post, and send its song skyward,
And the last note will hang in the air.
For there’s something about that sad
sound
That haunting sound when they play The Last Post
You can feel something deep in your soul
As tho’ you’ve been touched by a ghost...
Les Mellet
* * *
The Battle Ground
With Diggers’ blood in foreign mud, and flies and stench and gore
And the wounded scream and the rest just dream, of life before the war,
And the twang and whine of the bullets flying, and the machine gun’s deadly tap
And smoke filled air and a sense of despair, and the mortar’s lethal clap.
Day after day ’til no one cares and no one thinks to stop,
And night after night we continue to fight and kill the cream of the crop
Ten thousand a day we waste good men, we snuff their youthful life,
Then we do it again and again and again in this terrible useless fight.
The Sergeant’s back is broken and the Corporal long since dead
The soldiers’ eyes are sunk right back in his bandaged blood-stained head;
The medic sits in a sludge-filled pit with a bullet in his heart,
And the coward cries as the hero dies, his body ripped apart.
And no one knows where the boundary goes or who is shooting who
And the world’s a mess and you hope at best that you’ll manage to see it through.
Well the years long past from that war at last, I made it out alive
And every year we march and drink beer to those who didn’t survive.
But the dreams still come and the scars never left, and I’m missing an eye and an ear,
And the sight of young men in greens with a gun, still strangle my soul with fear.
But I guess I’ll get by just living a lie and I’ll see it through ’til the end
But my heart and my mind are shattered inside, and my soul can never mend.
Ron Wilson
Thoughts of Home
I’ve just come in off duty
And I’m feeling rather blue
So the best thing I can think of
Is to drop a line to you.
Writing seems to cheer one
Makes a man remember home
And often makes him wonder
Why he commenced to roam.
Now if by chance they get me,
Should put me out of gear,
I’ll go out like a Briton
But in the meantime while I live
When the bombs and cannon roar
I’ll pray with all my heart, Dear,
That we will meet once more.
And when the boys come sailing back
To great Australia fair,
Among the smiling happy band,
Here’s hoping I’ll be there.
Lt Alfred William Salmon
(AWM PR 00297)
* * *
For Honour and for Her
Somewhere a woman, thrusting fear away,
Faces the future bravely for your sake,
Toils on from dawn till dark, from day to day,
Fights back the tears, no heeds the bitter ache;
She loves you, trusts you, breathes in prayer your name,
Soil not her faith in you by sin or shame.
Somewhere a woman — mother, sweetheart, wife —
Waits betwixt hopes and fears for your return;
Her kiss, her words, will cheer you in the strife
When death, itself, confronts you grim and stern.
But let her image all your reverence claim
When base temptations scorch you with their flame.
Somewhere a woman watches, thrilled with pride,
Shrined in her heart, you share a place with none.
She toils, she waits, she prays till side by side
You stand together when the battle’s done
O keep for her dear sake a stainless name,
Bring back to her a manhood free from shame!
Anon
(AWM PR 91 104)
* * *
Dear Mother
Dedicated to my mother, Winifred Colenso
Weep not Mother darling,
Drive away those tears,
You think I’m still a baby
But I’m older than my years.
Now that I’ve joined the colours
I must go away
To help my fellow countrymen
In the coming fray.
For many years you nursed me
And kept me fit and well,
If I thought it would help you
I’d gladly go through hell.
Do not be despondent,
For I hate to see you blue,
No matter where I travel
I will always think of you.
As the person who has loved me
And reared me with fond care,
Your son can’t be a shirker,
He too, must do his share.
As much as this does grieve me
To go away from you,
I must do my duty
As you would wish me to.
Although I know it hurts you
To see your son depart,
I can but assure you,
That you’ll always own my heart.
Raymond John Colenso
(AWM PR 00689)
* * *
Mothers Day
Australians are in action
In Libya and in Greece,
While some are in Malaya —
As yet, they’re still at peace.
Again the name Anzac
Is known throughout the world,
It’s these sons of heroes
Who keep our flag unfurled.
To Hitler they’re a menace,
These lads so brown and tall,
The way they wield their bayonets
Forms a solid human wall.
But to mothers in Australia,
These men are only boys —
They remember them as babies,
Playing with their toys.
Men or boys it matters not,
Whichever they may be,
Their mothers will be waiting
And watching at the Quay.
The sons they nursed for many years
Are fighting far away,
They who kept them fit and well
Now — can only pray.
Mothers Day comes once a year,
This time it brings regret,
Are ribboned: “Lest we Forget.”
But others bring back memories
Of men who strive and fight
To protect their mother’s safety —
This will shall conquer might.
Raymond John Colenso
(AWM PR 00689)
* * *
When
Many of the wealthy men,
In business all their lives,
Often have to travel
Overseas without their wives.
They know upon departure
The date when they’ll return
To their families in the country
Of the waratah and fern.
But men who join the AIF
Know not when and where
They’ll see the faces
Of their loved ones free from care.
They’re fighting for a right to live,
For peace from racial hate,
But for many of the heroes
Peace will reign too late.
I left my wife and baby
By Sydney Harbour’s shore
To go and join my comrades
And put an end to war.
My curly headed baby boy
Is much too young to know
That his father couldn’t stay behind —
I simply had to go.
If the war lasts many years
There will be the danger
That David will
not know me,
He’ll consider me a stranger.
Pearl, my wife, will teach him
To hope and pray for peace;
She knows that I cannot return
Until this war does cease.
Raymond John Colenso
(AWM PR 00689)
* * *
Thoughts
When the still of night is creeping
My thoughts return to home,
To far and distant Sydney
Whose streets I once did roam.
The loved ones I have left behind
Are brought quite near to me,
The sacred gift of thinking
Forms a bridge across the sea.
Visions of the future
Help to aid my lonely heart,
And the noble art of writing
Plays a most important part.
To make a life-like image
Of the ones I left behind,
It prevents the threat of boredom
From preying on my mind.
Discomforts are forgotten
When my thoughts commence to stray
To the many happy moments
Before I sailed away.
My lonely heart is sated
By the thoughts of friends who wait
For the deliverance of mankind
From these days of strife and hate.
Raymond John Colenso
(AWM PR 00689)
* * *
Dreams
When I left Sydney Harbour,
Its calm blue waters deep
Became a graven image
To haunt me while I sleep,
And remind me of my homeland
Many thousand miles away,
Of the womenfolk I left behind —
Oh! How I rue that day!
When I left my Mother
And sailed across the blue,
I also left three sisters,
There was a girlfriend too.
Every night in slumber
I meet them all again —
How I curse when ’wakened
By steady pouring rain!
In the early hours
When my eyes are closed in sleep,