One of my Facebook Groups for local photographers runs it’s own challenges every month, In January it is based on the poem by Dorothy Mackellar – My Country. Take a photo to depict one line from this poem. I chose ‘I love her jewel-sea’, but now I can’t quite decide on which image (top or bottom)? We can only use one.
I love this poem, it speaks to us as Australians, we understand each and every line. This country is rugged, dangerous and the wild life pretty much all wants to kill you………….but oh the majesty and the beauty. If you don’t know the poem, here it is
The love of field and coppice,
Of green and shaded lanes.
Of ordered woods and gardens
Is running in your veins,
Strong love of grey-blue distance
Brown streams and soft dim skies
I know but cannot share it,
My love is otherwise.I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror –
The wide brown land for me!A stark white ring-barked forest
All tragic to the moon,
The sapphire-misted mountains,
The hot gold hush of noon.
Green tangle of the brushes,
Where lithe lianas coil,
And orchids deck the tree-tops
And ferns the warm dark soil.Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When sick at heart, around us,
We see the cattle die –
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady, soaking rain.Core of my heart, my country!
Land of the Rainbow Gold,
For flood and fire and famine,
She pays us back threefold –
Over the thirsty paddocks,
Watch, after many days,
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze.An opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land –
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand –
Though earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.
Even now the area where both these photos were taken is still struggling with bush fires.
Photos from Google Images
So which image do you think I should use for this challenge? Which depicts a jewelled sea – top of bottom?
-Julz
Love the top one!
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Top one definitely! Jewels, the sea and geology 🙂
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Thanks Sarah
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My pleasure 🙂
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I love this poem too, it sums up all that we are in Australia. I like the first image but all are wonderful. Happy new year. 😊
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thanks, same to you
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Th top one is my favourite image. _ very Australian to me
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That’s a beautiful poem, thanks for sharing it. I love both photos but the top one would be my preference – I particularly love the colours of the ocean.
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Thanks
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