Melbourne, Oh Melbourne,
How the proud has fallen.
Deserted streets and closed doors,
Schools without children and the MCG in darkness.


The public is masked and commanded to stay indoors.
Work, study, lonely, tired.
Don’t leave the radius, 
Charged by the dynasty of Flavius.


The most liveable city in the world,
They gasped at us and saw our triumph,
That was Melbourne in a smiling portrait,
Luna Park has now lost her grin.


Once the capital of sport, culture, and coffee,
fashion, food,  and education.
Our domination has turned to obliteration. 
This desirable city has been truly flattened.


Trust built on vanity,
Faith pumped with hubris.
We preached a message of greatness,
That’s now exposed for being ever so shallow.


Now the world looks on,
And observes with ponderous note,
What has happened to that once great metropolis,
That promised land of flowing milk and honey?


The Bible always warned,
“Pride goes before destruction, 
a haughty spirit before a fall”.
But we knew better, for we are superior,
To all those lesser places of Paris, New York, 
and Bendigo.  


Disasters come and they’re hard to take,
Lives are altered and even taken.
Hardship forced upon unwilling participants,
And prosperity’s security is proven fake.


The day will dawn and Melbourne reopen,
Sport will play and coffee drunk,
Shops will fill and come the Boxing Day Test too.
But what will Melbourne do with her ostentation?


Sailing on the bay,
And jogging the tan,
Trams running along Swanston Street,
Clogged with Melbourne’s Renaissance man.


To repeat Rome’s folly,
Is the drunken bloke’s slur.
Dressing wounds and crying peace,
Our prophets are prolific.


“Stand at the crossroads and look
    ask for the ancient paths,
ask where the good way is, and walk in it,
    and you will find rest for your souls.
    But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.