Henry Lawson

A Dan Yell

I WISH I’d never gone to board
   In that house where I met
The touring lady from abroad,
   Who mocks my nightmares yet.
I wish—I wish that she had saved
   Her news of what she’d seen—
That Dan O’Connor is clean shaved
   And parts his hair between.
 
The ladies down at Manly now—
   And widows understood—
No more deplore their marriage vow
   Or hopeless widowhood.
For Dan O’Connor is the same
   As though he’d never been,
Since Daniel shaved that shave of shame,
   And combed his hair between.
 
No more, Oh Bards, in Danyel tones
   He’ll voice our several fames,
And nevermore he’ll mix our bones
   As once he mixed our names.
Let Southern minstrels dree their weird
   And lay their sad harps down,
For Dan O’Connor’s shorn of beard
   And cracked across the crown.
 
The lobby and refreshment room
   Are shorn of half their larks,
A newer ghost now haunts the gloom
   That knew the ghost of Parkes:
The brightest joke Australia had
   Is but a hopeless grunt—
It went for ever mad and bad
   When Daniel shaved his front.
 
The fair Spotswhoshky weeps indeed—
   Frogsleggi and Bung Lung—
With none to greet and none to speed
   Them in their native tongue!
By Sucklar Key nor Golden Gate
   No Dan is ever seen
Since Dan O’Connor wiped his “slate”
   And notched his top between.
 
But—Dan O’Connor—(Lord knows best
   The thing might be a sell)—
You surely will forgive a jest
   From one who wished you well—
When we’ve forgot the face we feared
   And Time has deadened pain,
Oh! Dan O’Connor, grow your beard,
   And come to us again.
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