Posts Tagged ‘Melbourne’
I live on the beautiful Port Phillip Bay, almost an inland sea.
There’s always a fuss made about the wonderful beaches in Australia and, don’t get me wrong, there are some incredibly beautiful beaches. Long stretches of white-gold sand, sometimes a hundred miles long, and all pretty well empty as far as the eye (carefully protected behind sunglasses) can see.
I really enjoy getting up to the tropics, the steamy rains and the thick ferns, the umbrella trees, the cottonwoods, quandongs, orchids and Singapore daisies of the rain forest, but nothing can replace the calm gray waters of the Bay for me.
I grew up alongside these slowly rolling waters. I suppose you can’t get away from childhood memories. Now I live by the confluence of creek and river, where the Merri tumbles into the Yarra, on the river’s last meander to Port Phillip Bay.
On introspective days it reminds me of these words from Swinburne.
From too much love of living,
From hope and fear set free,
We thank with brief thanksgiving
Whatever gods may be
That no man lives for ever;
That dead men rise up never;
That even the weariest river
Winds somewhere safe to sea.
