John Farrell (Australian poet)

John Farrell (18 December 1851 – 8 January 1904) was an Australian poet and journalist.

• O radiant Land! o'er whom the sun's first dawning
     Fell brightest when God said, "Let there be light";
  O'er whom the day hung out its bluest awning
     Flushed to white deeps of star-lustre by night!
  • "Australia", st. 1. Andrew Garran (ed.) Australasia Illustrated (Picturesque Atlas Publishing Co, 1892) vol. 1, p. xi. Revised in How He Died and Other Poems (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1905) p. 1: "... Whitening to wondrous deeps of stars by night."

• Why didst thou mask the radiant smile thou wearest?
     Why wert thou veiled from all the eager eyes?
  Why left so long, O first of lands and fairest,
     Beneath thy tent of unconjectured skies?
  • "Australia", st. 4 (1892). Revised (1905): "Why did'st thou mask the happy face thou wearest? ..."

• I can't say I ever knew the lady.
  • When asked whether he had deserted the Muse, as quoted in B. G. Andrews, "Farrell, John (1851–1904)", Australian Dictionary of Biography, vol. 4 (Melbourne UP, 1972)

• Sleep Heart of Gold! 'Twas not in vain
  You loved the struggling and the poor,
  And taught, in sweet and strenuous strain
  To battle and endure.
  The lust of wealth, the pride of place,
  Were not a light to guide thy feet,
  But larger hopes and wider space
  For hearts to beat.
  • Epitaph, inscribed on his gravestone in Rookwood Cemetery

• Encyclopedic article on John Farrell (Australian poet) on Wikipedia