Has there been an Australian poet as troubadorish and piratical as Duncan Hose? The work is a response to an imaginary Auden's (or someone's) pronouncement that poetry be playful or drunken speech, linguistically badly behaved - more sweet-sounding than anything I can think of in Australian English. - Michael Farrell Born in Van Diemen's Land, Duncan Hose is the author of Rathaus, One Under Bacchus and Bunratty. A shillelagh is a blackthorn club used variously as a walking stick, a companion, and a weapon. A Jewelled Shillelagh is what you have in your hands.