Henry Lawson: Knocked Up

Henry Lawson

(1867-1922)

Knocked Up

I’m lyin’ on the barren ground that’s baked and cracked with drought,

And dunno if my legs or back or heart is most wore out;

I’ve got no spirits left to rise and smooth me achin’ brow —

I’m too knocked up to light a fire and bile the billy now.

Oh it’s trampin’, trampin’, tra-a-mpin’, in flies an’ dust an’ heat,

Or it’s trampin’ trampin’ tra-a-a-mpin’

through mud and slush ‘n sleet;

It’s tramp an’ tramp for tucker — one everlastin’ strife,

An’ wearin’ out yer boots an’ heart in the wastin’ of yer life.

They whine o’ lost an’ wasted lives in idleness and crime —

I’ve wasted mine for twenty years, and grafted all the time

And never drunk the stuff I earned, nor gambled when I shore —

But somehow when yer on the track yer life seems wasted more.

A long dry stretch of thirty miles I’ve tramped this broilin’ day,

All for the off-chance of a job a hundred miles away;

There’s twenty hungry beggars wild for any job this year,

An’ fifty might be at the shed while I am lyin’ here.

The sinews in my legs seem drawn, red-hot — ‘n that’s the truth;

I seem to weigh a ton, and ache like one tremendous tooth;

I’m stung between my shoulder-blades — my blessed back seems broke;

I’m too knocked out to eat a bite — I’m too knocked up to smoke.

The blessed rain is comin’ too — there’s oceans in the sky,

An’ I suppose I must get up and rig the blessed fly;

The heat is bad, the water’s bad, the flies a crimson curse,

The grub is bad, mosquitoes damned — but rheumatism’s worse.

I wonder why poor blokes like me will stick so fast ter breath,

Though Shakespeare says it is the fear of somethin’ after death;

But though Eternity be cursed with God’s almighty curse —

What ever that same somethin’ is I swear it can’t be worse.

For it’s trampin’, trampin’, tra-a-mpin’ thro’ hell across the plain,

And it’s trampin’ trampin’ tra-a-mpin’ thro’ slush ‘n mud ‘n rain —

A livin’ worse than any dog — without a home ‘n wife,

A-wearin’ out yer heart ‘n soul in the wastin’ of yer life.

Henry Lawson poetry

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