With The Quandongs

IF you happen to visit the Western Plains When the summer is young and green, You can see the green of the quandong leaves With the quandong fruit between. The fruit is the size of a plum, perhaps, And red as your own blood's hue; And it falls to the ground at the touch of the wind Like a drop of crimson dew. The wide plains lie with half-shut eyes At peace in a golden swoon, And the lizards drink their full of rest Abask in the drowsy noon. There is only the whir of a wing, perchance, To startle the sleeping lands; But the quandong trees, all green and red, Are a-twinkle with little hands. Oh, many a tress has turned to grey, And many a song grown mute Since Rita and Meg and Trixie and I Went gathering quandong fruit. And there we were on the plains alone In the hush of a drowsy air — Rita and Meg with roguish eyes And Trixie with wayward hair. A far mirage of mingled sun and dream Was born of the noontide sleep, And the rifled fruit of the quandongs lay At our feet in a ruddy heap. I know that the quandong's burning fruit Still reddens the drowsy air; That Trixie is grown and sometime wed, And Rita is grave and fair. I know that Meg of the roguish eyes, Though ten long years be sped, Still plucks the fruit of the quandong trees When the quandong fruit is red. I know — and I know to my loss, alas! — That I stand where the winds blow cold, And search, with others, another tree For its scanty fruit of gold.