Mount Mulligan Disaster The natives called it Icu, This mount of strange taboo; In later years the white men Could call it ‘Icu’ too. As, on that far September morn, In nineteen twenty one, Near eighty miners were to die, Before their shift was done. That fearful blast which tore the earth, Would all those lives destroy, T’was heard as far away, they said, As distant Mt. Malloy. The smoke that spiralled upward, Hung there - a telling cloud, That could be seen from far flung miles; An awesome funeral shroud. A rescue came, as rescues do, To succour those in woe, But far beyond all human need, Were those entombed below

The brooding mount still gazes down, Upon its vast domains And notes that man’s brief interlude, Has left but few remains. The mine has closed, the town has gone, All things a fading scar; No coal trains rattle on the rails, From here to Dimbulah. The quiet bushland grows again, T’will shadow those at rest And here the ’roos might graze again And here the birds might nest. But: On that far September morn, With day not long begun, Near eighty miners were to die, Before their shift was done.   Clarry Dunstan

Back to Clarry Dunstan Verse Summary

Back to Rodd's Gallery