A Dan Yell

I WISH I’d never gone to board
  In that house where I met
The touring lady from abroad,
  Who mocks my nightmares yet.
I wish—I wish that she had saved
  Her news of what she’d seen—
That Dan O’Connor is clean shaved
  And parts his hair between.

The ladies down at Manly now—
  And widows understood—
No more deplore their marriage vow
  Or hopeless widowhood.
For Dan O’Connor is the same
  As though he’d never been,
Since Daniel shaved that shave of shame,
  And combed his hair between.

No more, Oh Bards, in Danyel tones
  He’ll voice our several fames,
And nevermore he’ll mix our bones
  As once he mixed our names.
Let Southern minstrels dree their weird
  And lay their sad harps down,
For Dan O’Connor’s shorn of beard
  And cracked across the crown.

The lobby and refreshment room
  Are shorn of half their larks,
A newer ghost now haunts the gloom
  That knew the ghost of Parkes:
The brightest joke Australia had
  Is but a hopeless grunt—
It went for ever mad and bad
  When Daniel shaved his front.

The fair Spotswhoshky weeps indeed—
  Frogsleggi and Bung Lung—
With none to greet and none to speed
  Them in their native tongue!
By Sucklar Key nor Golden Gate
  No Dan is ever seen
Since Dan O’Connor wiped his “slate”
  And notched his top between.

But—Dan O’Connor—(Lord knows best
  The thing might be a sell)—
You surely will forgive a jest
  From one who wished you well—
When we’ve forgot the face we feared
  And Time has deadened pain,
Oh! Dan O’Connor, grow your beard,
  And come to us again.