non-exhaustive list, and not to imply that they are my favourites of those authors, or that tears are the only worthwhile effect a poem can have – just in my case the most disfiguring:

  1. ‘The Last Parade’ – Banjo Patterson
  2. ‘Somewhere friendly’ – Bruce Dawe
  3. ‘Old Gustav sings…’ – Judith Wright (that is the first line, not the name of the poem)
  4. ‘Into my heart an air that kills’ – A.E.Housman
  5. ‘Two chronometers…’ from ‘Five Visions of Captain Cook’ – Kenneth Slessor

‘The Last Parade’ is the worst. I can’t read it out loud to the end without breaking down. It’s embarrassing.

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