While The Billy BoilsSearchIn vast and unimaginable space,Where countless suns send forth their life-light raysEach to his group of whirling satellites,There rolled one little miserable ball,And on that ball a tiny atom kneltAnd prayed the Great Controlling Force of allTo wreck the order of the universe,Unchain the suns and cast the spheres adrift,Set world careering madly on to world,And bid ungoverned chaos come again!For what ?To damp the dot whereon the atom dwelt!
Poem
Praying for Rain
by W. T. Goodge · 1899
Sources, publication & text notesReference details
Canonical recordPOEM-001419
Copy-textExact text of the Goulburn Evening Penny Post, 27 June 1899, p. 4 (Trove article 98681118; SRC-000181); the complete lifetime review quotation is preserved as its own source-bound manifestation without blending later collection readings
Source recordSRC-000181
Rights determinationRGT-001305
Text statusCANONICAL TEXT READY
TranscriptionDIPLOMATIC_D208
While The Billy Boils · Public-domain text · www.whilethebillyboils.com.au/poems/praying-for-rain