The Weakness of Strength: Big Pat's Tale

Big Pat of Big Pat’s Creek

a sonnet
for John & Anne - and all my Irish Australian friends

Ahoy! dweller of these now Tamed Lands, share
my late-comer’s prayer
for one brave breaker, Big Patrick O’Hannigan,
mountain country man,
of those big whiskers, big tempers, big thirsts,
and an even bigger dare,
who was the Upper Yarra Goldfield’s first-n-last
wild viking Irishman!
Good on a risk! adventuring or fighting, trouble
making, drinking -
The same Big Pat who unearthed the first gold
at Hoddles Creek
and then drowned in his ‘rich’ self - maybe he was
losing something
sacred when he gave the strength of his name
to Big Pats Creek,
a Samson. Did he nurse a broken catholic heart
of remorse, regret?
in the bend down to depression? in those sick 1863
days after a bad thirst
had ended, taking rope to the high ridge pole of
the tent and debt
he shared with Peter ‘The Swede’ Petersen,
as if he was cursed,
on Emerald Diggings. He ended himself, age 37,
in that unearthly hole
he hadn’t strength to dig himself out of: Lord have
mercy on his soul.

10 June 2006 © Wayne David Knoll