The Fence

The fence

by Mick Martin



A band of men as joined by iron chains,
though older souls, now all but free or young.
These rocks of old, the weighty molten grains,
a laboured group with scant a smile among.
The fences rise from rolling ancient plains.


The molten lava fallen from up high,
rests soft on grass, a verdant fertile green,
as convict men, each heave and push then sigh.
A paddock cleared, so not one rock is seen,
work hard so hard they hope they may just die.

Through sadness night and blisters often tend
the songs of old may greet their longing ears.
A task so hard and yet no wretched end
and on and on through all these many years,
the mornings colder still their backs to bend.

What mother may have borne this wasted child?
Trod streets of rock not rough or scarred like these
and smile at father once as she beguiled.
One word from her, this pain to gently ease,
with mothers touch so soft and all too mild.

The guards who flail and crack their bloodied whip
care not, or little, for each ragged man,
unless at night, through darkness thence to slip
before attending fated silent clan
for freedoms drink, the briefest sacred sip!

The gentry ride and click a lofty tongue,
the fence reveals a crooked rocky chain.
"That's where the runaway was fatal hung"
"Then leave the fence to show the rebels pain"
and rumours labour spreads from tongue to tongue.

Will fences fall in time like men as built?
Or stand an epitaph in years to those
whose tears and often blood then flowing spilt.
No words in rock, no books or greater prose
for minor crimes have carried little guilt.

The fence of pain and rock, from here to there,
one hundred years or more and maybe three!
A statue long, theirs many years to bear.
Volcanic, rocky fence and hanging tree.
No don't forget, these men, no don't you dare!

- Mick Martin



Volcanic rock fences were built around Victoria by convict and forced labour