Old Campbell The Swaggy Poem by Francis Duggan

Old Campbell the Swaggy is in Port Fairy today
But by this time tomorrow he will be on his way
Perhaps towards New South Wales and in a bigger town
So many roadways he has been up and down

With wrinkled brown face from life in the open air
Old Campbell self barbers his long straggly dark greying hair
An amiable old fellow of him one can say
There are few of his kind left in the Australia of today

In festivals in old rural towns in the brown countryside
By people Campbell the Swaggie is known far and wide
He recites old poems and bush ballads he learned as a boy
To so many people this man has brought joy

Old Campbell the Swaggie his body now showing the wear of time
At least twenty five years past his physical prime
He has often slept on his swag on the unsheltered ground
Without bushes or trees anywhere near around

Old Campbell the Swaggie he leads an adventurous life
Cannot say if he did father children or has had a partner or wife
In South East Australia he is widely known
One can say of him that he is in a class of his own.