Semper Gratus by James Cayce, the pen name of Zbigniew “Zig” Ignaszak, is a deeply personal tribute to his father and to the people whose courage and sacrifice helped shape Australia.
Zig came to Australia from Poland in 1949 as an eighteen-year-old and has always considered himself fortunate to have been given a new life in this country. Through reflections on migrants, pioneers, farmers and diggers, this poem expresses the gratitude at the heart of his family’s Australian story.
Semper Gratus is Latin for Always Grateful.
Semper Gratus
By James Cayce
Wherever I stand in this wide brown land
’neath her warm familiar sun,
My mind gets cast to days long passed,
To a father and his son.
And I think again of the women and men
That let their courage run,
And my gratitude becomes renewed
For the freedoms that they won.
For I came to a place quick to embrace
The dispossessed and the poor,
That heard the pleas of refugees
From countries ravaged by war.
And a silent prayer I utter there
For a father who looked and saw
An outstretched hand in a far-off land
From the ones who came before.
I have faced no court where a verdict brought
A sentence of terror and dread,
To a wretched life with cruelty rife
For the sake of a loaf of bread.
And I’ve never known the hardships thrown
At the ones who challenged the West,
When its call was heard and their spirits stirred
With hopes that their prayers were blessed.
I have known no ills like Burke and Wills,
Or the rest of the pioneers,
Whose lives were lost when Fortune tossed
Her scorn at their grand ideas.
I have never seen pastures green
Wither in a hot wind’s breath,
Nor lived insane for the lack of rain
And watched the approach of Death.
I never did feel the cold hard steel
Of a bayonet in my hand,
Or a Digger’s dread that lay half-dead,
Yet obeyed each new command.
The battles they fought, the peace they bought
For that monumental sum,
The price they paid for the lives they made
And the lives of those to come.
I have never toiled in trousers soiled
With an inch of sweat and mud,
Or mined for coal in a devil’s hole
While fear ran through my blood.
I have never borne the sight of a dawn
Too cloudless and too bright,
Or loaded a gun when the merciless sun
Made me do to my stock what’s right.
And Heaven knows if I’d seen crows
Torture a lamb to death,
’Twould haunt my days like a ghost that stays
Till I’ve sighed my final breath.
But the Farmer’s seen — and the Digger’s been —
To the depths of worse despair,
Still they persevere through constant fear
And fill well the boots they wear.
I never will meet any who beat
The worst of The Outback’s will,
Their time and mine could never entwine,
But I know of their courage and skill.
None could have guessed when they ventured West
The hand that Fate would deal,
The floods, the droughts, the landlord’s shouts,
Repelled with a spirit of steel.
They have forged a land vast and grand
With a mettle beyond all worth,
A jewel that lies ’neath endless skies,
The loveliest land on Earth.
Where the Southern Cross extends its gloss
O’er wattles that wave in the breeze,
Unstilled yet by those who set
Their sights on this gem to seize.
Now I gladly raise a glass in praise
Of those who have kept us free,
The many despairs for them and theirs
Were also suffered for me.
And that father who saw what many ignore
Knew well his answered prayer,
And in his way would often say,
Advance Australia Fair.
Preserved Through Keeping The Verse Alive
Semper Gratus is shared with permission from James Cayce as part of Keeping The Verse Alive, Country Campfire’s bush poetry preservation project.
The poem preserves not only Zig’s gratitude for Australia, but also the memory of his father and the sacrifices of the generations who helped build the country he came to call home.
James Cayce
Bush Poet • Humourist • Storyteller • Parody Writer
James Cayce is the pen name of Zbigniew “Zig” Ignaszak, a bush poet and storyteller whose work blends humour, parody, memory, gratitude and Australian country verse.
Poems, recitals, photographs, stories and original works remain the property of their original creator and are shared by Country Campfire with permission.
