Recently in Stars and the Universe Category

Alone in the Southern Heaven,
   We gleam like a cross on high,
More bright than the Pleiad seven --
   The lords of the stars of the sky.
And Orion, though belted in glory,
   And Aldebaran's ancient blaze;
And the far dim systems hoary,
   Deep sunk with their nebulous haze--
Are not more mighty in power,
   Than we, as our sacred light
Shines calm in the silent hour
   Of the solemn and deep midnight.

When the children of men are sleeping,
   "Star speaketh unto star,"  
In rhythmical melody sweeping,
   Solemnly sweet afar.
And they sing of light's wondrous dawning,
   As the glow of His gaze sublime,
In creation's glorious morning,
   Gave birth to the beings of time.

When the children of men's salvation
   Was wrought out in Palestine,
His cross grew a sign to each nation,
   Of a hope and a future divine.
But our Heaven hung symbol was never
   Beheld by a Christian eye,
Till Iberia's gaze saw our wondrous rays
   In the deeps of the southern sky.
Yet we glowed through Eternity's ages,
   Undimmed down the vistas of time,
Aloft on night's heavenly pages,
   As a symbol of futures sublime.

As the Mariner's Star sunk slowly,
   Deep hid down the northern night,
We rose like an omen holy
   On his wearied and anxious sight;  
And shone on the awe-struck Spaniard,
   As his lonely caravel,
With storm-bleached shroud and lanyard,
   Surged up the mountain swell
Of the shoreless Southern Ocean;  
   And the gleam of our unknown rays
Awoke all his soul's devotion,
   In an outburst of prayer and praise.
For we rose on his sight as the symbol
   Of a life beyond the grave,
And a heavenly goal for each wanderer's soul,  
   'Midst the wastes of that wild lone wave.  

When the spirits of those whom Heaven  
   Reclaims from their mortal world
Hath new vision unto them given,
   With their angel wings unfurled --
As they soar with the seraph spirits
   Through the depths of the ether space,
'Midst the stars which each soul inherits,
   Of the children of heavenly race --
How they will see with wonder,
   And awe, and reverent love,
The planet orbs sinking under,
   And suns rising bright above.
As their earth grows dimly duller,
   A speck in the lower night --
And o'er them brightening fuller,
   With fathomless seas of light --
Each gorgeous constellation
   Glows in their raptured eyes,
Fresh from life's dull probation,
   'Midst luminous loftier skies.

Then shall they see, with a tender
   And solemn deep joy, the blaze
Of the clear transcendant splendour
   Of our clustering stars, and their rays --
Ruby, and purple, and golden,
   Gleaming a myriad fold,
More than all jewels beholden
   By them in earth's visions of old.
For though we but seem unto mortal
   Four stars, like a hierophic sign,
We show but the mystical portal
   To galaxies yet more divine,--

Whose clustering sunshines of glory --
   System on system afar --
Undimmed through antiquity hoary,
   With many an opaline star,
Burns bright on the broad brow of Heaven,
   'Midst its mightiest diadems,
As we circle around the "great seven,"
   Like His cross, set with worlds for our gems.

First published in The Australian Town and Country Journal, 14 August 1875

Author reference site: Austlit

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Crowned monarch of the starry sky,
   Forerunner of the day
All other orbs that shine on high
   Must pale before thy ray.

If, as to legends old we find,
   Man's destinies are thine,
Whose paths art those amongst mankind
   On which thy fell rays shine?   

Ambition's votaries dost thou lure,
   Up, up the giddy height;
Led on by hopes that ne'er endure
   The test of Truth's stern light.

If so, the historic roll of fame
   Bears witness to thy sway,
Telling of deeds done in that name
   By men long passed away.

Napoleon must have watched thee rise,
   From many a camp-fire's side;
Earth's empires then would scarce comprise
   The yearnings of his pride.

Yet the same beams that coldly kissed
   His flashing spears upborne,
Loured sadly, dimly, through the mist
   Of Waterloo's dread morn.

And hovering o'er the Atlantic spray,
   With thy calm, changeless smile,
Thou sawest him wear his heart away
   On Saint Helena's Isle.

And he, the celestial one, who bore
   Thy name in heaven afar,
From hell's abyss shall rise no more,
   Oh, fatal morning star!   

Still, in lone majesty shine on,
   Creation's radiant king;
The unceasing woe thou look'st upon
   To thee no change can bring.

In some new life the grave beyond,
   Then yet our home mayest be;
When freed from every earth-wrought bond,
   Our souls are fit for thee.

First published in The Queenslander, 1 June 1872

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

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They tell us yonder new-found star
   That beams on mortal bowers,
It needed half ten thousand years
   To reach this Earth of ours.

And yet -- O strange! -- it may by now
   Be dead in ashes cold,
And quenched may be the tender ray
   That tints our Night with gold.

And so, perchance, thy word may shine
   What time thy life is o'er,
And send abroad a silver sign
   To light a distant shore.

Ay, so, perchance, may proudly gleam,
   When thou hast left this clime,
The mem'ry of thy noble deed
   Adown the deeps of Time!

First published in The Bulletin, 17 February 1921

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

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Thy purpose, heavenly Stranger, who may know
But He who linked thee to the starry Whole?
We see thou journeyest, -- and no more; for of
The birth of Motion, save as the first step
Of God's creative power, Mankind even yet
May but conjecture, as they did of old,
The Shepherd Sages of the mystic East.   
Yet may we dream of thee in thy career,
As of a wandering symphony from amidst,
The planetary Voices of the World;   
Singing together, in their sun-led choirs,
The divine song of an eternal order.

Thus may we dream of thee -- and I, methinks,
With an especial privilege; for I,
(Unweetingly indeed) of all who watched
Thy coming, saw thee first in my own Land:
Then having wandered forth alone, as wont,
To steep my heart in the rich sunset -- lo,
I saw, half doubtingly, its fading hues
Leave thee sole wonder of the twylight sky.

But now, since thou hast travelled high in Heaven,
Thousands of wondering Spirits, all are out
Duly each night, with upturned looks, to drink
The mystery of thy beauty.

               In thy dust
Bright visitation, even thus, thou sawst
The young, the lovely, and the wise of Earth,   
A buried Generation, thronging forth
In wonder, to behold thee pass, and then
Know thee no more ; and when the flaming steps
Of thy unspeakable speed shall carry thee
Beyond our vision, all the beautiful eyes
Now opening up at thee, -- eyes made by Love
As tender as the turtle's, or that speak
The fervent soul and the majestic mind,
Shall be fast closed in death, and give for aye
Their lustre to the grave, ere thou again
Shall drive thy fiery chariot round the Sun!
But orbs as beautiful and loving -- yea,
More radiant in their wisdom, from a more
Enlarged communion with the soul of Truth,
Shall gaze at thee instead, heavenly Stranger,
When thou return'st again! -- Ah, what a dream!
Ah, what a shadow is the life of Man!

First published in The Maitland Mercury & Hunter River General Advertiser, 2 December 1846;
and later in
The Bushrangers, a Play in Five Acts, and Other Poems by Charles Harpur, 1853; and
The Poetical Works of Charles Harpur edited by Elizabeth Perkins, 1984.

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian Poetry Library

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Upon the hill there stood, as in a painting,
The old white house the palm-tree, and the star,
Leaning so near, it seemed, so close together,
Is that reality? One shines afar.

A myriad miles! A sun through aeons blazing
In stellar space: what is this house, this tree,
Engirt by time, compared to that star ranging
The dark, lone laneways of Infinity?

And yet the tree that is so kindly growing,
The house that man for man has builded well --
These are beloved within their day, while lonely
The star shines on, remote, immutable.

First published in The Sydney Morning Herald, 14 September 1935

Author: Marjorie Quinn (1889-1972) was born in Sydney, the daughter of Patrick Quinn and the niece of Roderic Quinn. She was a foundation member and first secretary of the Fellowship of Australian Writers, a foundation member of the PEN Club, and secretary of the Society of Women Writers.

Author reference site: Austlit

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Lapis lazuli, blue with mystery,
Lay ocean, chiming its low symphony,
Waking pale thought of the eternities,
Of 'tranced dawns, and stellar silences
Of night, when planets in their courses ran
Ere the metonic law of life began,
As slowly rose the mitred sovran steeps,
To form the barriers of the Protean deeps.

The centuries pursue the endless quest,
And, 'mid the tumult of the world's unrest,
Potential units, aching with desire,
Look to the great centrifugal white fire,
Till, marvelling and lost in the immense,
They reason: "Whence came the Omnipotence,
Creator, yet Himself the Uncreate,
Who ever was?" The problem, intricate,
Remains unsolved, for none may fathom Him.
The mind is finite -- theories wax dim;
But genesis of matter is not vain,
For microcosms die to flame again.

The seals are broken; science probes the sod,
Tracing God's footprints where no mortal trod;
Scaling the apex of eternal snows,
Poised on gigantic silver wings, and knows
No languor the supernal heights to climb,
Inspired with aerial visionings sublime:
And mind o'er matter in the strenuous race
Flings wide the gateways of cerulean space.
And man applauds, as, with deep, bated breath
It winnows germs of life from husks of death.
Rich voices that had once divinely stirred
The inmost being, now long mute, are heard
In thrilling numbers of mellifluous sound
The while the singer lies in sleep profound.

Thus is unwound the hieroglyphic scroll,
And clear-eyed sapience with eager soul
Peers into dark abysms unrevealed,
Which in earth's withered matrix lie concealed.
Boccaccio's close ne'er heard a stranger tale
From beauty, carmine-lipped and olive pale --
Than queenly charm, now turned to dust and mould,
Which the vast theatres of age unfold,
When opulence and loveliness clasped hands,
Stealing along the desert's burning sands,
Who seeks may find that essence whence we came,
Whose mystery sets pulsing thought aflame;
But, to the lilting of this antique rhyme,
Emerging from dim galleries of time
In blue magnificence, remotely far,
There, on night's forehead, gleams a splendid star.

First published in The Brisbane Courier, 21 August 1926

Author reference sites: Austlit, Australian Dictionary of Biography

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