| Walter Murdoch (1874–1970). The Oxford Book of Australasian Verse. 1918. |
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| 40. Wattle and Myrtle |
| | | By James Lister Cuthbertson |
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| GOLD of the tangled wilderness of wattle, | |
| Break in the lone green hollows of the hills, | |
| Flame on the iron headlands of the ocean, | |
| Gleam on the margin of the hurrying rills. | |
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| Come with thy saffron diadem, and scatter | 5 |
| Odour of Araby that haunts the air; | |
| Queen of the woodland, rival of the roses, | |
| Spring in the yellow tresses of thy hair. | |
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| Surely the old Gods, dwellers in Olympus, | |
| Under thy shining loveliness have strayed, | 10 |
| Crowned with thy clusters magical Apollo, | |
| Pan with his reedy music might have played. | |
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| Surely within thy fastness, Aphrodite, | |
| She of the Seaways, fallen from above, | |
| Wandered beneath thy canopy of blossom, | 15 |
| Nothing disdainful of a mortal’s love. | |
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| Aye, and her sweet breath lingers on the wattle, | |
| Aye, and her myrtle dominates the glade, | |
| And with a deep and perilous enchantment | |
| Melts in the heart of lover and of maid. | 20 |
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