Kalorama Poem by Francis Duggan

The squawking of the white cockatoos are carrying in the evening breeze
In late Spring in Kalorama home of the tall gum trees
And the call of the king parrot and the crimson rosella's flute like song
By their calls they are distinctive once heard you won't get them wrong.

Those mighty mountain ash trees they seem to touch the sky
The smallest at least thirty metres judging by the naked eye
There once were trees on these hills one hundred metres tall
Captured by the late and great Dandenong Ranges artists on canvas they hang on many a gallery wall.

Kalorama east of Melbourne it is such a peaceful and beautiful place
And the people who live in these mountains from others seem a different sort of race
They are people who love Nature and close to Nature they wish to stay
And the busy Melbourne eastern suburbs to them not far enough away

From Kalorama east of Melbourne that has inspired the bards to rhyme
Where the Indigenous people told their stories of their marvellous Dreamtime
With the mighty mountain ash trees reaching skywards all around
They tower above the houses standing on the higher ground.