A Sunburnt Country
Wading through mists of the mountains’ breath
the wet white air,
once thought to be spirits of the dead,
and adding our quota… This chill
that pulls neat water from the air
— a torched leaf trickles,
rolls tears along the blade.
Then the brief downpour.
Gullies, like washing machines switches on,
churn soil downhill.
The bush path is a tunnel into mist,
where every spider’s web is seen
flagged out with silver buoys.
The lorrikeet shuffles dejected feathers,
sipping weak nectar. A huntsman
crosses the path, half crushed
beneath the rain’s broom;
it walks on grass stalks, a blind tightrope walker
feeling in eight directions.
Hairs on a banksia leaf
repel drops and store the dryness
(tomorrow there may be fire).
– Mark O’Connor
These scents are a fundraiser for Country Fire Authority Victoria in the hopes that we can help ameliorate the suffering caused by Australia’s bushfire crisis.
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My Country Perfume Oil
Out of StockI love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me!
– Dorothea MackellarHer far horizons, her jewel-sea: a rose-tinted sunset of amber salt spray azure musk.
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The Kangaroo Perfume Oil
Out of StockKanagaroo, Kangaroo!
Thou Spirit of Australia,
That redeems from utter failure,
From perfect desolation,
And warrants the creation
Of this fifth part of the Earth,
Which would seem an after-birth,
Not conceiv’d in the Beginning
(For GOD bless’d His work at first,
And saw that it was good),
But emerg’d at the first sinning,
When the ground was therefore curst; —
And hence this barren wood!Kangaroo, Kangaroo!
Tho’ at first sight we should say,
In thy nature that there may
Contradiction be involv’d,
Yet, like discord well resolv’d,
It is quickly harmonized.
Sphynx or mermaid realiz’d,
Or centaur unfabulous,
Would scarce be more prodigious,
Or Pegasus poetical,
Or hippogriff — chimeras all!
But, what Nature would compile,
Nature knows to reconcile;
And Wisdom, ever at her side,
Of all her children’s justified.She had made the squirrel fragile;
She had made the bounding hart;
But a third so strong and agile
Was beyond ev’n Nature’s art;
So she join’d the former two
In thee, Kangaroo!
To describe thee, it is hard:
Converse of the camélopard,
Which beginneth camel-wise,
But endeth of the panther size,
Thy fore half, it would appear,
Had belong’d to some “small deer,”
Such as liveth in a tree;
By thy hinder, thou should’st be
A large animal of chace,
Bounding o’er the forest’s space; —
Join’d by some divine mistake,
None but Nature’s hand can make —
Nature, in her wisdom’s play,
On Creation’s holiday.For howsoe’er anomalous,
Thou yet art not incongruous,
Repugnant or preposterous.
Better-proportion’d animal,
More graceful or ethereal,
Was never follow’d by the hound,
With fifty steps to thy one bound.
Thou can’st not be amended: no;
Be as thou art; thou best art so.When sooty swans are once more rare,
And duck-moles the Museum’s care,
Be still the glory of this land,
Happiest Work of finest Hand!
– Barron FieldWild grass, mosses, lemon myrtle, cinnamon myrtle, and bush nut.
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Waltzing Matilda Perfume Oil
Out of StockUp sprang the swagman and jumped into the waterhole,
Drowning himself by the Coolibah tree;
And his voice can be heard as it sings in the billabongs,
“Who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me.”Who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda, my darling.
Who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me.
Waltzing Matilda and leading a water-bag.
Who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me.
– Banjo PatersonDusty vanilla bean and Moreton Bay Fig.