Where the Dead Men Lie (poem)

Out on the wastes of the Never Never — That's where the dead men lie! There where the heat-waves dance forever — That's where the dead men lie! That's where the Earth's loved sons are keeping Endless tryst: not the west wind sweeping Feverish pinions can wake their sleeping — Out where the dead men lie!

Where brown Summer and Death have mated — That's where the dead men lie! Loving with fiery lust unsated — That's where the dead men lie! Out where the grinning skulls bleach whitely Under the saltbush sparkling brightly; Out where the wild dogs chorus nightly — That's where the dead men lie!

Deep in the yellow, flowing river — That's where the dead men lie! Under the banks where the shadows quiver — That's where the dead men lie! Where the platypus twists and doubles, Leaving a train of tiny bubbles. Rid at last of their earthly troubles — That's where the dead men lie!

East and backward pale faces turning — That's how the dead men lie! Gaunt arms stretched with a voiceless yearning — That's how the dead men lie! Oft in the fragrant hush of nooning Hearing again their mother's crooning, Wrapt for aye in a dreamful swooning — That's how the dead men lie!

Only the hand of Night can free them — That's when the dead men fly! Only the frightened cattle see them — See the dead men go by! Cloven hoofs beating out one measure, Bidding the stockmen know no leisure — That's when the dead men take their pleasure! That's when the dead men fly!

Ask, too, the never-sleeping drover: He sees the dead pass by; Hearing them call to their friends — the plover, Hearing the dead men cry; Seeing their faces stealing, stealing, Hearing their laughter, pealing, pealing, Watching their grey forms wheeling, wheeling Round where the cattle lie!

Strangled by thirst and fierce privation — That's how the dead men die! Out on Moneygrub's farthest station — That's how the dead men die! Hard-faced greybeards, youngsters callow; Some mounds cared for, some left fallow; Some deep down, yet others shallow. Some having but the sky.

Moneygrub, as he sips his claret, Looks with complacent eye Down at his watch-chain, eighteen carat — There, in his club, hard by: Recks not that every link is stamped with Names of the men whose limbs are cramped with Too long lying in grave-mould, cramped with Death where the dead men lie.