Poetry Sunday 15 February 2015

Said Hanrahan by P.J. Hartigan (“John O’Brien”)

“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan
In accents most forlorn
Outside the church ere Mass began
One frosty Sunday morn.

The congregation stood about,
Coat-collars to the ears,
And talked of stock and crops and drought
As it had done for years.

“It’s lookin’ crook,” said Daniel Croke;
“Bedad, it’s cruke, me lad
For never since the banks went broke
Has seasons been so bad.”

“It’s dry, all right,” said young O’Neil,
With which astute remark
He squatted down upon his heel
And chewed a piece of bark.

And so around the chorus ran
“It’s keepin’ dry, no doubt.”
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.

“The crops are done; ye’ll have your work
To save one bag of grain;
From here way out to Back-O’-Bourke
They’re singin’ out for rain.

“They’re singin’ out for rain,” he said,
“And all the tanks are dry.”
The congregation scratched its head,
And gazed around the sky.

“There won’t be grass, in any case,
Enough to feed an ass;
There’s not a blade on Casey’s place
As I came down to Mass.”

“If rain don’t come this month,” said Dan,
And cleared his throat to speak –
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan, ”
If rain don’t come this week.”

A heavy silence seemed to steal
On all at this remark;
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed a piece of bark.

“We want an inch of rain, we do,”
O’Neil observed at last;
But Croke “maintained” we wanted two
To put the danger past.

“If we don’t get three inches, man,
Or four to break this drought,
We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.”

In God’s good time down came the rain;
And all the afternoon
On iron roof and window-pane
It drummed a homely tune.

And through the night it pattered still,
And lightsome, gladsome elves
On dripping spout and window-sill
Kept talking to themselves.

It pelted, pelted all day long,
A-singing at its work,
Till every heart took up the song
Way out to Back-O’-Bourke.

And every creek a banker ran,
And dams filled overtop;
“We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“If this rain doesn’t stop.”

And stop it did, in God’s good time:
And spring came in to fold
A mantle o’er the hills sublime
Of green and pink and gold.

And days went by on dancing feet,
With harvest-hopes immense,
And laughing eyes beheld the wheat
Nid-nodding o’er the fence.

And, oh, the smiles on every face,
As happy lad and lass
Through grass knee-deep on Casey’s place
Went riding down to Mass.

While round the church in clothes genteel
Discoursed the men of mark,
And each man squatted on his heel,
And chewed his piece of bark.

“There’ll be bush-fires for sure, me man,
There will, without a doubt;
We’ll all be rooned,” said Hanrahan,
“Before the year is out.”

Comments by Ira Maine, Ferguson Tractor.

I have nothing to add to this wonderful bit of poetry except to say that it has all of that glorious, dry laconic sense that is so much part of the unique Australian sense of humour.

Interestingly, as a kid in Ireland, we heard this poem regularly recited on the national broadcaster, Radio Eireann.  I firmly believed it to be an Irish home grown piece so you can imagine my surprise to discover that the poem’s creator, Patrick Joseph Hartigan was not only a Catholic priest, but was born in Yass in NSW and spent most of his life as the parish priest there!

Hartigan, (nom-de plume ‘John O’Brien’) (1879-1952) cleverly shows in the poem how the Irish use of the English language hung on in some cases but was being altered in others.

In the third verse, Daniel Croke says; ‘It’s lookin’ crook,’ which is typically Australian.  Then, in the next breath he says; ‘Bedad it’s cruke, me lad…’ which is unmistakeably rural Irish, ‘cruke’ being Hartigan’s way of showing how easily the two pronunciations of the word existed in the same sentence. (crook, book, cook, hook and, nook, being pronounced to this day in Ireland in the same way as ‘duke’.

Incidentally, the Church has always forbidden the use of the word ‘god’ when swearing a coarse oath.  It was known as “Taking the Lord’s name in vain’..

So ‘Bedad, its’s cruke, me lad…’  is a euphemism. ‘Bedad’ really means ‘by Jesus’.  ‘By Gob’ and ‘BeGorrah’ were also used.   My own father used to say ‘be (by) the Lord Harry..’  (whoever Harry was) all ways of getting round the problem.

As a last (I promise) observation, Hanrahan’s drought might easily have been the 25 year drought, the longest on record, which happened around the time of Federation.  And Daniel Croke was right; Speculators created a huge banking crisis in the 1890s.  Luckily, Australia was rich enough then to survive it.

I have no need to tell you how great this poem is.

Go on! Wallow in it!