Lake Macquarie History

A Day in Burwood Glen

Alfred Sharp, 1889

Published in Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners Advocate

Wednesday 2 January 1889, page 2

photo: picnic burwood lagoon








Photograph from our collection: Picnic at Burwood Lagoon (Glenrock) pre 1900











A toil-worn city dweller,

Fair visions come to me

Of the sweet, cool, green translucence

Underneath the greenwood tree;

This pleasant vision rises

Again, and yet again,

Till I go where green leaves rustle,

Far from the haunts of men -

Till I leave the city's bustle

For the depths of Burwood glen.


I follow up the winding streamlet

Up it’s moss-grown boulder bed -

The craggy rocks up-rising

Tower in the air o'erhead;

The starry daisy noddeth

from many a rocky nook;

And maiden-hair ferns whisper

Their secrets to the brook,

Which laughing goes and tells them

To all, without rebuke.


The gum trees towering skyward

Their starry blossoms show;

The wild clematis twineth

Her arms around her love,

And murmurs tender secrets

To tremendous leaves above,

In love-tones, softly echoed

By the cooings of the dove.


The morning sun down streameth

With all his radiance bright;

Each tree-top lies a-basking

In blaze of golden light;

He peepeth through the branches,

And merrily plays bo-peep

With the sweet, shy flowerets peeping

From nooklets cool and deep,

While they flush at being wakened

By his kisses from their sleep.


At noonday, growing bolder,

How ardent are his beams;

He clasps within his brightness

The rocks, and trees and streams;

Flowers droop beneath is ardour,

And hide their glowing face,

While his blazing eyes are searching

The secrets of each place,

And his languorous love-kisses

Pervade each hidden space.


At sunset, ere he goeth,

He bids them all good-bye

With gold and crimson kisses

Flung from the western sky;

The flow'rets peeping upward,

Say "Love, dear love, good-night;"

While towering eucalypti

Bathe in his glowing light,

And give back kiss for kisses,

Till fall the shades of night.


Sweet is thy calm, O Burwood

Far up thy lovely glen,

In thy Dryad-haunted bowers,

Far from the haunts of men,

I have passed a day of quiet,

I have passed a day of rest,

And from all the things around me

I have drawn some happy zest;

For Nature there has shown me

Her loveliest and best.


Alfred Sharp

Newcastle 1889

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