Henry Lawson

The Song and the Sigh

The creek went down with a broken song, 
’Neath the sheoaks high; 
The waters carried the song along, 
And the oaks a sigh. 

The song and the sigh went winding by, 
Went winding down; 
Circling the foot of the mountain high, 
And the hillside brown. 

They were hushed in the swamp of the Dead Man’s Crime, 
Where the curlews cried; 
But they reached the river the self-same time, 
And there they died. 

And the creek of life goes winding on, 
Wandering by; 
And bears for ever, its course upon, 
A song and a sigh.