Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE SEARCH, by CHARLES SHAW


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE SEARCH, by                    
First Line: I've dropped me swag in many camps
Last Line: The big white bull through wagga.
Subject(s): Bulls; Legends; Revenge


I'VE dropped me swag in many camps
From Queensland west to Boulder,
An' struck all sorts of outback champs
An' many a title-holder.
But though I've heard the episode
Be drover told, an' dogger,
I've still to meet the bloke who rode
The big white bull through Wagga.

I struck the hero out at Hay
Who beat the red-back spider
In fourteen rounds one burnin' day;
An' up along the Gwydir
There lives the man outslept the toad—
A champeen blanket-flogger—
But he is not the bloke who rode
The big white bull through Wagga.

The cove that hung up Bogan Gate
Once called me in a hurry
To buy drinks for his "China plate",
The bloke that dug the Murray.
An' though down south of Beechworth road
I met Big Bob the Frogger,
I've still to meet the bloke who rode
The big white bull through Wagga.

The man who steered the kangaroo
From Cue to Daly Waters;
The cove who raced the emu, too,
To win three squatters' daughters;
I know the fellow moved the load
That stopped the Richmond logger;
But still I want the bloke who rode
The big white bull through Wagga.

But some fine day I'll run him down,
An' stop his flamin' skitin'.
I'll punch him on his lyin' crown,
Or go down gamely fightin'.
For I'm the bloke to whom is owed
What's paid that limelight-hogger.
I'd love to meet that bloke who rode
The big white bull through Wagga.





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