Emily’s Poems

Eight of Emily’s botanical poems can be found in ‘Watercolours and Poems: Emily Harris New Zealand Mountain Flora 1894-1910’ accompanying the alpine artwork. A transcription and discussion of Emily’s poem ‘Lines Written on Visiting Glenavon during the War 1860’ can be found in Michele Leggott’s creative essay ‘Writing Lines: Emily Harris’s Taranaki War’ and is also featured in ‘Some Dark and Spectral Bird of War‘ (PDF), alongside Emily’s other 1860 poem ‘Come cast all gloomy cares away.’

A pdf collation of all available poems from Emily can be found here.

The Poetic Landscape of 1840-1869

As we search for Emily Harris’s poems a picture is emerging of mid-nineteenth-century poetry in Taranaki before and after the wars of the 1860s. These poems give some context for what Emily was writing and sending to friends and family during that time. They are a mix of published and manuscript poetry, the tip of what was probably a much larger field of production in an era that recited poetry and sang songs for entertainment and instruction. Topical satire, light verse, mock epic, mock pastoral, patriotic bravado and personal address to beloved places or people: the poems build a world of strong feeling and local detail.

The passing moments to beguile 1840-50

• HE Stokes, God Speed the Ship (1841)
• John Hursthouse, A Taranaki Song (1845)
• Josaiah Flight, Poems for Annie and Sarah Flight (1849)

Chibiabos in Taranaki 1850-59

• Josaiah Flight, When Hulke has learned the truth to tell (1853)
• Alexander King, Old England (1854)
• Anonymous [CW Richmond], The Town and the Bush, or Appearance and Reality (1855)
• Anonymous, The Society of Rhymers (1855)
• Anonymous [Henry Richmond], Ecloga 1 (1857)
• Anonymous [Amelia Jane Atkinson], Surely for man ’twas never meant (1857)
• Anonymous [Hugh Ronalds], A Shopman’s Lament (1857)’
• Anonymous [Arthur Atkinson], Chibiabos in Taranaki (1857)
• Anonymous [Charles Manby], An Apostrophe (1859)

Some Dark and Spectral Bird of War 1860-69

• Anonymous, The Battle of the Waireka (1860)
• anonymous [Dr JT Rouse], Ode to New Zealand: A Growl in a Sou’-wester (1860)
• Matthew Fitzpatrick, A glimpse of Taranaki, during a false alarm – (August 4, 1860) (1860)
• Emily Harris, Come cast all gloomy cares away (1860)
• Clara Fairly, A Song for Our Redoubtable Soldiers (1860)
• Matthew Fitzpatrick, Assault on Kingi — 11th Sept., 1860 (1860)
• Matthew Fitzpatrick, The Taranaki Refugee (1860)
• Matthew Fitzpatrick, Though lovely the valleys and hills of the Maori (1860)
• Matthew Fitzpatrick, To – – – – (1860)
• Emily Harris, Lines Written on Visiting Glenavon during the War 1860
• Anonymous, Nursery Rhyme (1860)
• Alexander King, The Death of Taiporutu (1860)
• Anonymous, Taranaki 1859 and 1860
• Anonymous, The Taranaki Mother’s Lament (1861)
• John Cross, The Poet’s Dream (1863)
• Josaiah Flight, Song: When McLean Comes Up (1865)

A pdf of ‘Some Dark and Spectral Bird of War: Taranaki Poems 1845-1861’ is available here.