Where the moss’s gentle fingers paint the sleeping
boulders green,
I’ll walk, in all my wisdom, where no mortal’s
ever been,
And where immortal trees stretch up their fingers to the
sky,
The moss will cool the water for the lyre-bird and I.
Sing out, happy lyre-bird, your song for everyone,
The parrot in the treetop, the quail that likes to run,
The whistler in the canopy, the honey-eater’s call,
Sing out, happy lyre-bird, beside the waterfall.
Like octopus’s tentacles, the roots of trees have
grown,
With steel embrace, they vainly try to crush the hearts
of stone,
And stone from stone, and tree from stone, or is it stone
from tree?
They wrestle, in the half-light, for the lyre-bird and
me.
I see the pythons writhing, and the Titans fighting, too,
And a sudden shaft of sunlight trying Cinderella’s
shoe,
And, where the half-light weakens, and the roots are tangled
wild,
I seem to see a carving of Madonna and her child.
But the lyre-bird has found me, and he’s trying
out my air,
He sends his voice out mocking me, from here, and over
there,
So I’ll bluey up my blankets, where no mortal’s
ever been,
And the moss’s gentle fingers paint the sleeping
boulders green.
