Worldwind Sydney



A screenshot from NASA’s globe software World Wind showing
Sydney Harbour inlet at right and Botany Bay at left.

"The spacious harbour with its hundred coves
And fairy islets - seats of savage loves."
From William Charles Wentworth's poem Australasia.
See full poem at Australian Poetry Library.

I am not sure that this was an image that William Wentworth was visualising when he wrote these lines in 1822 but the photographic image does show the many Sydney coves. A cove is a small type of bay or coastal inlet, usually with a narrow entrance that protects it's waters from the currents of the bay. The word cove comes from the Old English word cofa, which means shelter. Australian's are familiar with the word cove as we all learnt at school that in 1788 Captain Phillip discovered and named Sydney Cove, a small inlet in the harbour, which he found suitable for a settlement.

Wentworth wrote the poem Australasia while he was studying, at Cambridge University, in England as an entry into a poetry competition in which he was awarded second prize.

William Charles Wentworth (1790-1872) was an explorer, poet, journalist, barrister, landowner, and politician. He set up the first non-government newspaper, The Australian, to champion the rights of Australians and his many causes such as representative government, the abolition of transportation of convicts, freedom of the press and trial by jury. The paper had a liberal editorial leaning and pitted it's writings against "the exclusives" in Sydney and sought equal rights and status for ex-convicts.

World Wind is a virtual globe developed by NASA for use on personal computers running Microsoft Windows. It allows you to zoom from outer space into any place on Earth with the use of satellite imagery and elevation data so you can see in 3D as if you were there.

Get a more detailed biography of William Charles Wentworth.

View of Sydney, Australia, from Gladesville road bridge by Les Murray

From the book: The People's Otherworld  by Les Murray       

Theres that other great arch eastwood, with it's hanging highways;
the headlands and horizons of packed suburb, white amongst bisque-fired, odd smokes rising;
theres Warrang the flooded valley that it is now the ship chained harbour...

Read full poem at Australian Poetry Library

ruled by poetry for tens of thousands of years

"The continent on which I live was ruled by poetry for tens of thousands of years, and I mean it was ruled openly and overtly by poetry. Only since European settlement in 1788 has it been substantially ruled by prose. The sacred law which still governs the lives of traditional Aborigines is carried by a vast map of song-poetry attached to innumerable mythic sites. Each group ‘sings’ the tract of country it occupies, just as each initiated person sings the ceremonial songs of the holy places for which he or she is responsible within that territory. A person may unselfconsciously say ‘That mountain is my mother: it is her ancestor and mine; it is the body of our ancestor, and the story we sing and enact there is her body. We are her body, too, and the songs are her body, and the ceremonies are her body. That is the Aboriginal Law.’ "

Read more of this amazing A Defense of Poetry a lecture given by Les Murray.

Citified

here in the city
the wind is colder
than memory.
people rush by...
why won't they stop and finish this poem?

Rain

ants run around

rain threatens their routine

Sydneysiders contemplate purchasing umbrellas

Sydney In The Spring.

A song! A song! with a chorus strong for the sweet September days
When Australia smiles with a lover's wiles in the Sun's adoring rays:
When the low coast sways in a purple haze...
Read full poem

From The Pearl and the Octopus a book by A. G. Stephens  (1865 – 1933) 
To D.O'R  



purple haze

Unfinished poem

Sit with me
in solitude
watching the world pass by
our belonging unspoken

Dance with me
in the roar
of birds and winds
and swaying trees
and grass and fronds

You cannot speak and I
will not break the silence

The Collective Consciousness

Here is a poem sculpture
it stands under the tree,
it is made from
                dry brown twigs and lamb's wool
                and old leather.
The words are not seen.
We all know them,
worn away by our
                constant touch
                scratched into our memory.

SHINE ON

Syd
bedazzles us tonight
                  running crazily
                                 carelessly
                                          laughing
into every previously dark nook and cranny
now lit up by her many faceted jewels
At each place she stops
and writes a poem with her firelight
held high
the words emblazoned
in the sky
for only
a moment

Escape

when daylight finally finds us
i can no longer stay
creep
down
cold side paths
glide
ghost like
effortless
your halo has dissolved
and i never had one

not enough

The lunatic walked in the room
she crossed the floor
surveyed the scene
scanned their brains
she wanted more
she left the room
she slammed the door

1974

(This is the earliest poem I remember writing. I think it is funny that I called it 'not enough' as it certainly isn't enough on many levels - mainly not good enough - but it is emblazoned in my brain over all these years as it obviously meant something at a formative part of my life. It was an angry poem and stood for wanting more as we all should in our teenage years. I am happier with my lot more often now but still assess what there is for me in any situation very quickly. I have learnt that it is not always about me. I still always tend to write less words than more.)