The Black Billy (1938)
Old sundowner's billy, battered and black,What tales you could tell of the far outback,
Where the sun beats down on the black soil plains,
In the "land of heat' where it seldom rains ! And when it does, the grass grows green,
And the trees are dressed in emerald sheen ;
While the golden wheat by the breeze is stirred,
And the bleet of the sheep on the plains is heard. You would tell us of days upon the road
If we could but read your secret code !
You would tell us of night beneath the stars,
Where the river winds by to its ocean bars. Oh, yes billy battered, old and black,
Amongst the rest of your owners pack.
You stand out clear, like the stars at
As a symbol storm, of stress and of light. A symbol of hope, and of labor and tears.
With stories now softened by passing of years,
A symbol of valleys, of bushland and flowers-
A symbol of this brown land of ours ! --Arthur Sargent Notes From the NSW Newspaper The Henty Observer and Culcairn Shire Register 29 Apr 1938 p. 5.