All audio files can be found on our catalog page: https://librivox.org/the-shakedown-on-the-floor-by-henry-lawson/
Each fortnight a poem is chosen to be recorded by as many LibriVox volunteers as possible!Despite the bittersweet outcome of the romance in this work, the poem still manages to conclude in an uplifting fashion. ( SonOfTheExiles)
This Fortnightly Poem was suggested by SonOfTheExiles.
This fortnight's poem can be found here.
Set your recording software to:
Channels: 1 (Mono)
Bit Rate: 128 kbps
Sample Rate: 44100 kHz
Have questions on "how"?
Check LV's Recording Notes thread before recording. If this is your first recording, you'll also find this Newbie Guide to Recording useful.
Begin your reading with the abbreviated LibriVox disclaimer:
No more than 0.5 to 1 second of silence at the beginning of the recording!
Then read the poem:The Shakedown on the Floor by Henry Lawson, read for LibriVox.org by [your name].
[Add, if you wish, date, your location, and/or your personal url.]
Set me back for twenty summers—
For I’m tired of cities now—
Set my feet in red-soil furrows
And my hands upon the plough,
With the two ‘Black Brothers’ trudging
On the home stretch through the loam—
While, along the grassy siding,
Come the cattle grazing home.
And I finish ploughing early,
And I hurry home to tea—
There’s my black suit on the stretcher,
And a clean white shirt for me.
There’s a dance at Rocky Rises,
And, when all the fun is o’er,
For a certain favoured party
There’s a shake-down on the floor.
You remember Mary Carey,
Bushmen’s favourite at the Rise?
With her sweet small freckled features,
Red-gold hair, and kind grey eyes;
Sister, daughter, to her mother,
Mother, sister, to the rest—
And of all my friends and kindred,
Mary Carey loved me best.
Far too shy, because she loved me,
To be dancing oft with me;
What cared I, because she loved me,
If the world were there to see?
But we lingered by the slip rails
While the rest were riding home,
Ere the hour before the dawning,
Dimmed the great star-clustered dome.
Small brown hands that spread the mattress
While the old folk winked to see
How she’d find an extra pillow
And an extra sheet for me.
For a moment shyly smiling,
She would grant me one kiss more—
Slip away and leave me happy
By the shake-down on the floor.
Rock me hard in steerage cabins,
Rock me soft in wide saloons,
Lay me on the sand-hill lonely
Under waning western moons;
But wherever night may find me
Till I rest for evermore
I will dream that I am happy
On the shake-down on the floor.
Ah! she often watched at sunset—
For her people told me so—
Where I left her at the slip-rails
More than fifteen years ago.
And she faded like a flower,
And she died, as such girls do,
While, away in Northern Queensland,
Working hard, I never knew.
And we suffer for our sorrows,
And we suffer for our joys,
From the old bush days when mother
Spread the shake-down for the boys.
But to cool the living fever,
Comes a cold breath to my brow,
And I feel that Mary’s spirit
Is beside me, even now.
At the end of your reading, leave a space and then say:
End of poem. This recording is in the public domain.
Please leave 5 seconds of silence at the end of your recording.
Save your recording as an mp3 file using the following filename and ID3 tag format:
File name - all in lowercase: shakedown_lawson_your initials in lowercase_128kb.mp3
(e.g. shakedown_lawson_klh_128kb.mp3 )
ID3 tags (Version 2.30): ID Tags are completed during Cataloging
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(If you wish to contribute, please have your readings submitted by 0600 GMT Sunday, April 8, 2018. (12:00AM CDT)
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(And remember, anyone can suggest a poem for a certain week and/or coordinate an upcoming fortnightly poem! If you'd like to suggest a poem or coordinate a future Fortnightly Poetry project, please visit this thread.)
