To the women of Australia is a question put today
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
And they must send the men they love to battlefields away,
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
To yeild their lives a sacrifice to bayonet and to gun,
For but one simple reason; Hughes declares it must be done!
And what, besides such reason is the loss of any son!
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
There’s a bitter warfare coming when conscription has its sway,
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
All the ideals Labor fought for must assuredly delay;
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
For the money Lord’s dominion will certainly increase,
Backed by martial regulation that their grip will not release,
While the Fat Man, smiling blandly, will declare that this is peace.
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
There are women who have given: there are those who have to give
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
Toil in jobs by men forsaken for the mere brave right to live
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
On the fraction of the wages that the men they lost had earned.
Will the woman find employment – into weary wage slaves turned -
While the man who seeks good wages – though a soldier will be spurned
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
For the little, lovely babies, there go dangers we must shun
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
There are dangers more repulsive than the far-off Prussian gun
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
Let us firmly hold our freedom, and refuse to let it go;
For an enemy is rampant who would lay our fair land low
And if we fail to answer the conscription question “NO”
(Oh, Mary, pity women!)
Harold Mercer Direct Action October 21 1916
