Vonda Stanley's collection of early Australian bush poems

 

Our Own Flag

They mustered us up with a royal din,

In wearisome weeks of drought.

Ere ever half of the crops were in,

Or the half of the sheds cut out.

'Twas down with the saddle and spurs and whip

The swagman dropped his swag.

And we hurried us off to the outbound ship

To fight for the English flag.

The English flag - it is ours in sooth

We stand by it wrong or right.

But deep in our hearts is the honest truth

We fought for the sake of a fight.

And the English flag may flutter and wave

Where the World-wide Oceans toss,

But the flag the Australian dies to save

Is the flag of the Southern Cross.

If ever they want us to stand the brunt

Of a hard-faught, grim campaign,

We will carry our own flag up to the front

When we go to the wars again.