Princes Bridge over the Yarra River in Melbourne (Australia)

When I die put me in a barra
Wheel me down to the banks of the Yarra
Dig a hole both deep and narra
Bury me by my brown Yarra
Now people change, they’ll let you down
They’ll hurt you too, that’s what I’ve found
And though that river flows like mud
In my heart and soul it flows like blood
Or drop me off of Princes Bridge
Strapped inside a broken fridge
Drop me down in the murky drink
And let me lie where I sink
...

Lyrics from My Brown Yarra

Frank Jones

Ross Bridge spanning the Macquarie River in Ross, Tasmania (Australia)

The road unravels as I go,
Walking into the sun, the anaemic
Sun that lights Van Diemen’s land.
This week I have sung for my supper in seven towns.
I sleep in haysheds and corners
Out of the wind, wrapped in a wagga rug.
In the mornings pools of mist fragment the country,
Bits of field are visible higher up on rides,
Treetops appear, the mist hangs about for hours.
A drink at a valley river coming down
Out of Mount Ossa; climb back to the road,
Start walking, a song to warm these lips
White-bitten with cold.
In the hedges live tiny birds
Who sing in bright colours you would not hear
In your fast vehicles. They sing for minstrels
And the sheep...

In a poem by Michael Dransfield

Harbour Bridge spanning the Parramatta River in Sydney (Australia)

"...you can see it from every corner of the city, creeping into frame from the oddest angles, like an uncle who wants to get into every snapshot. From a distance it has a kind of gallant restraint, majestic but not assertive, but up close it is all might. It soars above you, so high that you could pass a ten-storey building beneath it, and looks like the heaviest thing on earth. Everything that is in it – the stone blocks in its four towers, the latticework of girders, the metal plates, the six-million rivets (with heads like halved apples) – is the biggest of its type you have ever seen... This is a great bridge."

Bill Bryson's impressions of the Sydney Harbour Bridge

Tasman Bridge over the Derwent River in Hobart, Tasmania (Australia)

Hold me now, Oh hold me now
'Til this hour has gone around
And I'm gone on the rising tide
For to face Van Diemen's land

It's a bitter pill I swallow here
To be rent from one so dear
We fought for justice and not for gain
But the magistrate sent me away...

Lyrics from Van Diemen's Land 
by U2

Richmond Bridge over the Coal River in Richmond, Tasmania (Australia)

The Richmond Bridge is allegedly haunted. The story is as follows: a reputedly cruel jailer named George Grover often whipped convicts from a cart as they quarried sandstone from nearby Butcher’s Hill. One night in 1832, Grover staggered home after a drunken fight and fell asleep atop the bridge. He was pushed off during the night and fell seven meters to his death. No one was convicted of his murder, however it’s widely reported his ghost now haunts the bridge.

Legend of the Richmond Bridge.

Tasman Bridge spanning the Derwent River in Hobart, Tasmania (Australia)

"In memory of those who died.

In recognition of those who were affected.

In acknowledgement of those who assisted.

The Tasmanian Community remembers the Tasman Bridge disaster of 5 January 1975"

Plaque in the Tasmanian Bridge

Bolte Bridge across the Yarra River in Melbourne (Australia)

Once the water of the Yarra was locked in the mountains. This great expanse of water was so large that the Woiwurong had little hunting ground.  Mo-yarra, slow-and-fast-running, was the headman of the Woiwurong. He decided to free the country of the water. So he cut a channel through the hills. However only a little water followed him. At a later time the new headman of the tribe, Bar-wool, resolved again to free the land. He cut a channel up the valley with his stone axe. In Warr-an-dyte he met Yan-yan, another Woiwurong, who was busily engaged in cutting a channel for the Plenty River in order to drain Morang. They joined forces, and the waters of Moorool and Morang became Moo-rool-bark, the Place-where-the-wide-waters-were. They  had to go much slower now because the ground was much harder. They were also using up too many stone axes. At last they reached Port Phillip and the waters of Moorool and Morang rushed out. The country of the Woiwurrong was freed from water but Port Phillip was inundated.

Indigenous legend of the Yarra valley

Harbour Bridge spanning the Parramatta River in Sydney (Australia)

In her grey majesty of ancient stone 
She queens it proudly, though the sun's caress
Her piteous cheeks, ravished of bloom, confess,
And her dark eyes his bridegroom glance have know.
Robed in her flowing parks, serene, alone,
She fronts the east; and with the tropic stress
Her smooth brow ripples into weariness;
Yet hers the sea for footstool, and for throne
A continent predestined. Round her trails
The turbid squalor of her streets, and dim
Into the dark heat-haze her domes flow up;
Her long lean fingers, with their grey-old nails,
Giving her thirsty lips to the cool brim
Of the bronze beauty of her harbour's cup

Poem Sydney

Arthur Henry Adams

Story Bridge over the Brisbane River in Brisbane (Australia)

Sometimes within her reedy curves,
Sometimes across her sandy bars,
A drowned face, tired of every day,
Awaits the judgment of the stars.

From the poem Brisbane River

Mabel Forrest (1915)

Bowen Bridge over Derwent River in Hobart, Tasmania (Australia)

My point of reference is this summer slope
these paddocks stacked like long plates of bread;
and at day's end, the black loaves of the hills
I am back in Hobart after years away
visiting remembered, holy places:
grey boulders in a small suburban creek,
the leopart spotted plane trees in the square.
The permanence of places does not recede;
the spiritual sky, the unencumbered air.

Poem Back in Hobart

Vivian Smith

King Street Bridge over the Yarra River in Melbourne (Australia)

O sweet Queen-city of the golden South,
Piercing the evening with thy star-lit spires,
Thou wert a witness when I kissed the mouth
Of her whose eyes outblazed the skyey fires.
I saw the parallels of thy long streets,
With lamps like angels shining all a-row,
While overhead the empyrean seats
Of gods were steeped in paradisic glow.
The Pleiades with rarer fires were tipt,
Hesper sat throned upon his jewelled chair,
The belted giant's triple stars were dipt
In all the splendour of Olympian air,
On high to bless, the Southern Cross did shine,
Like that which blazed o'er conquering Constantine.

Melbourne
Patrick Maloney

Sydney Harbour Bridge over Sydney Harbour (Australia)

Seventy five years you have battled through 

All around you, a changing view 

And you’ve watched the Sydney skyline rise 

You’ve breathed the air of polluted skies 

Oh, Sydney Harbour Bridge, Happy Birthday 

Happy Birthday, Harbour Bridge. 

Happy Birthday Harbour Bridge 

Theme by Jim Low