Old Botany Bay

by Dame Mary Gilmore

I am he, 
who paved the way,
that you might walk
at your ease today;

I was the conscript
sent to hell
to make in the desert
the living well;

I bore the heat,
I blazed the track -
furrowed and bloody
upon my back.

I split the rock;
I felled the tree:
The nation was -
Because of me!

Old Botany Bay
Taking the sun
from day to day ...
shame on the mouth
that would deny
the knotted hands
that set us high!