The Secret Key and Other Verses/The Nation Builders

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First published in The Australasian on 25 January 1896.

4227034The Secret Key and Other Verses — The Nation BuildersGeorge Essex Evans

THE NATION BUILDERS

A handful of workers seeking the star of a strong
intent
A handful of heroes scattered to conquer a conti-
nent–
Thirst, and fever, and famine, drought, and ruin, and
flood,
And the bones that bleach on the sandhill, and the
spears that redden with blood;
And the pitiless might of the molten skies, at noon,
on the sun-cracked plain,
And the walls of the northern jungles, shall front
them ever in vain,
Till the land that lies like a giant asleep shall wake
to the victory won,
And the hearts of the Nation Builders shall know
that the work is done.
To North, on the seas of summer, where the pearl
flotillas swim,
To East, where the axe is ringing in the heart of the
ranges grim,
On the plains where the free wind bloweth by
never a tree or shrub,
On the pine-topped slopes where the settler carves a
home in the tropic scrub,
On fields where the miner sleeps unstirred by the
ceaseless monotone
And crash of the stampers night and day at work on
the milk-white stone,
'Tis war and stress, with never a pause to mourn for
a stout heart gone,
Till the souls of the Nation Builders shall know that
the work is done.

On the deck of the lonely light-ship, in the sand of
the new-found West,
Where strong men fall and die like sheep in the thirst
of the golden quest,
By the dry stock routes, by the burnt-up creeks, where
the cattle sink and fail,
By the coral reefs, where the bêching boats swing on
'neath the sun-tanned sail,

In the wild ravine where the searcher's gold is bought
with his own heart's blood,
In the dark of the drive where the miner's life goes
out with the swirling flood,
'Tis war and stress, with never a pause to mourn for
a stout heart gone,
Till the lives of the Nation Builders have paid for the
victory won.

In the glare and steam of the cities, the thunder and
clatter of wheel,
By the teeming wharves, where the liners lie at rest
on an even keel,
In the strife of a swelling commerce, at the desk in
the dull routine
Where the soul of a man is warped and sunk to the
soul of a mere machine,
In the flash of the wire to west and north, in the hum
of the restless street,
In the pulse of the toiling press that beats all night
in a fever heat,
Where the weary brain and the pen plod on 'neath
the white electric light–
Tho' we fail and fall still the fight goes on; and ever
our sons shall fight,

Till the land that lies like a giant asleep shall wake
to the victory won,
And the hearts of the Nation Builders shall know
that the work is done.

We are but the hands of the Builder, who toileth and
frameth afar;
System, and order, and sequence; sun, and planet,
and star–
Faint sparks of a Mighty Genius, a breath of the
Over Soul,
Who shapes the thought of the workers wherever his
worlds may roll.
On! tho' we grope and blunder, the trend of our aim
is true!
On! there is death in dalliance whilst yet there is
work to do,
Till the land that lies like a giant asleep shall wake to
the victory won,
And the eyes of the Master Worker shall see that the
work is done.