THE art of bush poetry has enjoyed a resurgence as lovers of prose share their enthusiasm for the craft.
In July Moreton Border News published an article about Lynnette Lee and her discovery of a literary treasure.
Tucked away in old biscuit tins and chocolate boxes were original handwritten poems by famous bush poet Rebecca Morton (1895 – 1987).
She gave them to David Pahlke from Rosewood History Group for safe keeping.
While there’s plenty of male bush poets, female scribes are less common.
A modern day bush poet is Irishman Gerry Mannion.
Gerry’s lived in Australia for decades and loves bush poetry so much he joined a group dedicated to it.
His love for the spoken word is shared at events in Ipswich, throughout the Scenic Rim and beyond.
His mission is to try and keep bush poetry alive the best he can.
He’s doing that through two groups, Logan Performance Bush Poets and North Pine Bush Poets.
Bush poetry hasn’t been a part of his world that long.
A few years ago, while holidaying with his wife at Christmas Creek, he read a book of poetry and found it ‘absolutely amazing’.
“You learn so much through the language and the way things were said,” he said.
“Then I thought ‘hang on, I could write something too’.
“I’d written a poem for my wife on her birthday many years ago and completely forgot about it.
“She reminded me about it the other day.”
The Moreton Border News first met Gerry at an event in the Scenic Rim.
He was there on behalf of the Logan Performance Bush Poets.
Members of his group regaled audiences, they stood behind a lectern while reciting or reading bush poetry.
There were chairs placed beneath a gazebo, onlookers moved from standing and listening to sitting and watching entranced, hanging on to every word.
“I have only really been performing about three years,” he said.
“I suppose the reason I got into it was it took me 50 years to realise I couldn’t sing or play an instrument, so I decided to do bush poetry.
“We perform all over, when you start to empathize the performance aspect you’ve actually got to learn it.”
He’s learned his craft so well it’s garnered him awards.
“There’s a bush poetry competition at the Ekka every year and I entered it a couple of years ago but didn’t get anywhere,” he said.
“I entered again last year and got second place in one section so I entered again this year.
“This time I got two seconds, a first and won overall champion.”
He is an engineer by trade, he writes and performs poetry strictly for fun.
His bush poetry group meets usually the last Sunday of the month, he is also part of the North Pine Bush Poets.
“Back in the day for many people, bush poetry was an oral tradition, they were probably illiterate or not very good at reading or writing,” he explained.
“The way they passed stories down from A to B was by retelling them and doing that in their own style.
“A lot of the famous bush poets like Henry Lawson, Banjo Paterson and Will Ogilvie, told their stories about Australia with a different accent than the one we have today.”
There are 20 bush poets in his group, four of whom are women.
“It’s good to hear women [reciting bush poetry] because there are some poems that are better told by a woman, they’re either narrated by one or written for one.
“The history of it has been predominantly male but there have been some very good female bush poets, Dorothy McKellar is one of them,” he said.
The Rosewood community’s excitement over the discovery of Rebecca Morton’s original writings is proof the art of bush poetry is still of value and appreciated.
Gerry and his band of lyric lovers enjoy sharing their love for poetry with anyone who’ll listen.
“We go all over, we don’t charge except for a donation or perhaps sponsorship to cover expenses,” he said.
“As we run, we just rely on just our own membership and some of our MPs who are reasonably generous sponsors every year.”
