Thursday Lyrics: I Want A Hippopotamus for Christmas

The Little Anachronism was watching a video purporting to teach some math and economics. I was mostly ignoring it, but I couldn't help overhearing something about having a thousand dollars, and the possibility of buying a pet hippo with that money. That struck me as a bit unrealistic: wouldn't a hippo cost more than that? Being a nerd, I decided to see if I could figure out quickly (i.e. with some google work) what a hippo would cost. I couldn't find much, honestly, but in the discussion thread for this song, I did find the claim that you could buy a hippo in 1953 for $3000. Based on purchasing power parity measurements, that's roughly the equivalent of $24,000 today. I still don't know how much a hippo actually costs now, but it's enough for now.

Apparently my spouse encountered this song at camp. I never did, but it's cute, and in honor of the question, here it is.

I WANT A HIPPOPOTAMUS FOR CHRISTMAS
Words and music by John Rox
performed by Gayla Peevey (1953)

I want a hippopotamus for Christmas
Only a hippopotamus will do
Don't want a doll, no dinky Tinker Toy
I want a hippopotamus to play with and enjoy

I want a hippopotamus for Christmas
I don't think Santa Claus will mind, do you?
He won't have to use our dirty chimney flue
Just bring him through the front door,
that's the easy thing to do

I can see me now on Christmas morning,
creeping down the stairs
Oh what joy and what surprise
when I open up my eyes
to see a hippo hero standing there

I want a hippopotamus for Christmas
Only a hippopotamus will do
No crocodiles, no rhinoceroses
I only like hippopotamuses
And hippopotamuses like me too

Mom says the hippo would eat me up, but then
Teacher says a hippo is a vegeterian

There's lots of room for him in our two-car garage
I'd feed him there and wash him there and give him his massage

I can see me now on Christmas morning,
creeping down the stairs
Oh what joy and what surprise
when I open up my eyes
to see a hippo hero standing there

I want a hippopotamus for Christmas
Only a hippopotamus will do
No crocodiles or rhinoceroseses
I only like hippopotamuseses
And hippopotamuses like me too!

Thursday Lyrics: The John Birch Society

At some point last week, the line "To get this movement started we need lots of tools and cranks" started going through my head....



Chad Mitchell Trio : The John Birch Society
by Michael Brown

Oh, we're meetin' at the courthouse at eight o'clock tonight
You just walk in the door and take the first turn to the right
Be careful when you get there, we hate to be bereft
But we're taking down the names of everybody turning left

Oh, we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Here to save our country from a communistic plot
Join the John Birch Society, help us fill the ranks
To get this movement started we need lots of tools and cranks

Now there's no one that we're certain the Kremlin doesn't touch
We think that Westbrook Pegler doth protest a bit too much
We only hail the hero from whom we got our name
We're not sure what he did but he's our hero just the same

Oh, we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Socialism is the ism dismalest of all
Join the John Birch Society, there's so much to do
Have you heard they're serving vodka at the WCTU?

Well you've heard about the agents that we've already named
Well MPA has agents that are flauntedly unashamed
We're after Rosie Clooney, we've gotten Pinkie Lee
And the day we get Red Skelton won't that be a victory

Oh we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Norman Vincent Peale may think he's kidding us along
But the John Birch Society knows he spilled the beans
He keeps on preaching brotherhood, but we know what he means

We'll teach you how to spot 'em in the cities or the sticks
For even Jasper Junction is just full of Bolsheviks
The CIA's subversive and so's the FCC
There's no one left but thee and we, and we're not sure of thee

Oh, we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Here to save our country from a communistic plot
Join the John Birch Society holding off the Reds
We'll use our hand and hearts and if we must we'll use our heads

Do you want Justice Warren for your Commissar?
Do you want Mrs. Krushchev in there with the DAR?
You cannot trust your neighbor or even next of kin
If mommie is a commie then you gotta turn her in

Oh, we're the John Birch Society, the John Birch Society
Fighting for the right to fight the right fight for the Right
Join the John Birch Society as we're marching on
And we'll all be glad to see you when we're meeting in the John
In the John,
in the John Birch So- ci- i- teee.

Inauguration Lyrics: Power and Glory

The Power and the Glory
by Phil Ochs

Come and take a walk with me thru this green and growing land
Walk thru the meadows and the mountains and the sand
Walk thru the valleys and the rivers and the plains
Walk thru the sun and walk thru the rain

Here is a land full of power and glory
Beauty that words cannot recall
Oh her power shall rest on the strength of her freedom
Her glory shall rest on us all (on us all)

From Colorado, Kansas, and the Carolinas too
Virginia and Alaska, from the old to the new
Texas and Ohio and the California shore
Tell me, who could ask for more?

Chorus

Yet she's only as rich as the poorest of her poor
Only as free as the padlocked prison door
Only as strong as our love for this land
Only as tall as we stand

Chorus

Thursday Lyrics: Summer, Highland Falls

At random, ended up watching a National Press Club appearance by Billy Joel in which he talked about music and politics. We watched the question session, which was all music, and he ended up by singing one of my favorite Joel songs of all time. If you don't have any interest in the whole video, you can hear just the song.

Summer, Highland Falls
by Billy Joel

They say that these are not the best of times,
But they're the only times I've ever known,
And I believe there is a time for meditation in cathedrals of our own.
Now I have seen that sad surrender in my lover's eyes,
And I can only stand apart and sympathize.

For we are always what our situations hand us...
It's either sadness or euphoria.
And so we argue and we compromise,
and realize that nothing's ever changed,
For all our mutual experience, our seperate conclusions are the same.

Now we are forced to recognize our inhumanity,
Our reason co-exists with our insanity.
And though we choose between reality and madness...
It's either sadness or euphoria.

How thoughtlessly we dissipate our energies
Perhaps we don't fulfill each other's fantasies.
And so we'll stand upon the ledges of our lives,
With our respective similarities...
It's either sadness or euphoria.

Thursday Lyric: Going, Going, Gone

John McCutcheon's live version of this is infectiously joyous, not bitter.

Going, Going, Gone
by Si Kahn (1986)

Oh, the scene was so familiar with farmers all around
The auctioneer was standing there, he brought his hammer down
But when they started bidding the crowd let out a roar
For they heard something on that day they'd never heard before

CHORUS:
What am I bid for the White House? Come on, boys, don't be slow
They've overspent their credit so they'll just have to go
If they can't learn to manage it's time they're moving on
The leaders of this country are going, going gone!

Come on, let's start the bidding with that Congress on the hill
They're awful fond of spending, they just don't pay the bills
But with a little honest work we'll make them good as new
I hear they're handy on the farm if you show 'em what to do

CHORUS

Then the crowd grew silent you could hear a needle drop
They motioned up the White House and put it on the block
But no one bid a nickel, they just stared so hard and cold
'Cause you can't bid on something that's already bought and sold

CHORUS

And when the sale was over I sure did thank my luck
I paid for both my senators and loaded 'em on the truck
Now one has gone to milking and the other's gone to seed
By wintertime they'll understand just what the farmers need

CHORUS

Sold American!

Thursday Lyrics: I'm Changing My Name to Chrysler

I know it's not quite Thursday yet, but I've been having flashbacks to this all week. Can't imagine why....

I've just reproduced the last verse and chorus here, but you can read the whole thing here and hear Arlo Guthrie's version:



I'm Changing My Name to Chrysler
by Tom Paxton
©1980 Accabonac Music (ASCAP)

Since the first amphibians crawled out of the slime
We've been struggling in an unrelenting clime
We were hardly up and walking before money started talking
And it said that failure is an awful crime
Well it's been that way for a millenium or two
But now it seems that there's a different point of view
If you're a corporate titanic and your failure is gigantic
Down in Congress there's a safety net for you

CHORUS
I am changing my name to Chrysler
I am going down to Washington D.C.
I will tell some power broker
What they did for Iacocca
Will be perfectly acceptable to me
I am changing my name to Chrysler
I am headed for that great receiving line
So when they hand a million grand out
I'll be standing with my hand out
Yes sir, I'll get mine

Go to sleep, you weary hobo....

Utah "Bruce" Phillips has passed away. He was a singer/songwriter, a hobo in the grand classic style, but also an historian, both archival and oral. Oh, and an unparalleled storyteller. I never saw him perform, but my spouse did, and says that he spent so much time telling stories that he only got through about four songs! His breakthrough recording, in fact, was a story, Moose Turd Pie:

The worst job I ever had was working for the Pacific Railroad, doing a thing called "gandy-dancing." Now most of you know the railroad was built partially by Irish labor. Well, back then the workers would use this long handled shovel, made by the Gandy Shovel Company of Great Neck New York. Well, they'd shove one end of the shovel under a railroad tie, and then run out to the other end of the shovel, when they could find it, and do a little jig on it, and they called it "gandy-dancin'". This would lift the tie up so they could shove gravel under it, which would level the roadbed, so when the train came along, it wouldn't tip over, which would be a real drag for everyone.

Well, nowadays, they run three cars out on the rail: a bunk car, an equipment car, and a mess car. The only thing they don't give you is a cook. The bosses figure you'll find out who the best cook is, and use him. Well, they were wrong. Y'see, they just find out who complains the loudest about the cooking, and he gets to be the cook. Well, that was me, see. Ol' aligator mouth. That was the worst food I'd ever had, and I complained about it. Things like "dog bottom pie" and "pheasant sweat." I thought it was garbage. So I complained. And everyone said, "alright, you think you can do better? You're the cook." Well, that made me mad, see? But I knew, that anyone who complained about my cooking, they were gonna have to cook.

Armed with that knowledge, I sallied forth, over the muddy river. I was walking along, and I saw just this hell of a big moose turd, I mean it was a real steamer! So I said to myself, "self, we're going to make us some moose turd pie." So I tipped that prairie pastry on its side, got my sh*t together, so to speak, and started rolling it down towards the cook car: flolump, flolump, flolump. I went in and made a big pie shell, and then I tipped that meadow muffin into it, laid strips of dough across it, and put a sprig of parsley on top. It was beautiful, poetry on a plate, and I served it up for dessert.

Well, this big guy come into the mess car, I mean, he's about 5 foot forty, and he sets himself down like a fool on a stool, picked up a fork and took a big bite of that moose turd pie. Well he threw down his fork and he let out a bellow, "My God, that's moose turd pie!"

"It's good though."

Phillips wrote any number of songs that sound like they've been around forever. My favorite, though, isn't a hobo song, but a simple romantic statement of faith:

"The Hymn Song"
(Bruce Phillips)

You know I think if lady luck was blind
That old sun would never shine
And I believe if death really held a knife
We'd all be beggars of life

Chorus:
I believe if I lived my life again
I'd still be here with you
I believe if I lived my life again
I'd still be here with you

Sometimes I wish that I could close my eyes
To some things I don't want to see
But I believe if you lived your life again
You'd still be here with me

Chorus

I'll never see the ending of my mind
Everything will have a time
Why should I ask for things that I don't need
Or pretty lies to hide my greed

Chorus

Thursday Lyric: The Last Chance

The portions in italics are spoken, not sung.
The transcription is my own, and I am guessing about punctuation and line breaks.

The Last chance
by Leon Rosselson

It was The Last Chance.
It was a nightclub in the desert called the Last Chance
a cluttered dive of stones and wheels,
it was a refuge for the rootless of the world washed up
like driftwood on the sand
And we were there.
it seemed so long ago.

They came from nowhere.
The lost the broken and the mad, as if from nowhere
they blundered in like blind invaders
while Mahalia boomed a gospel song
and candles blurred the gloom,
they drank and argued till the dawn
had drained the night away.

Among the seekers after oil or truth or a home;
Among the businessmen, the pickpockets and whores,
among the soldiers and the tourists, Some had names, and histories
Meier, with his stone bald head built like a butcher, which he was
He made his money dealing in pork, though not on the Sabbath
They said his parents were killed in Belsen
They said he saw his sister raped
but no one really knew.
Stories swirled about like dust on the desert wind.
You never knew what was true.
but in the end it didn't really matter. There he was.
And Sam, with his mournful expression
and his mobile face like crumpled leather,
there he was, a dancer. Light, light on his feet.
Theirs was a needle match, each trying to outscore the other
Sam out of mischief
Meier out of a desire for victory.
so they came out of opposite corners of the ring in every argument --
everything was an argument.
like the Sinai campaign.
For Meier that was the time of glory.
"That was when we found out we were strong," he said.
"Strong?" shrugged Sam. "Who needs it?"
So Meier pinned his arm behind his back
and forced him to his knees.
"You do, Jew," he said.
The general opinion was that Meier won that round.

They came from nowhere.
The lost the broken and the mad, as if from nowhere.
they blundered in like blind invaders
while Mahalia boomed a gospel song
and candles blurred the gloom
they drank and argued till the dawn
had drained the night away

Do you remember?
the day the Bedouins came to town
I still remember
the women waiting still as stone
their silent shapes cocooned in black against the whitewashed walls
that echoed back the sun to blind the eyes
ghosts from another world

"You know what's wrong with Israel?" said Meier one night.
"I know," said Sam, dancing in grinning. "Too many Arabs, right?"
"Wrong," said Meier, "too many Jews. Look at them.
Rabble. They don't speak Hebrew, half of them. Rabble.
Take the Yemenis: donkey riders.
Never set foot in a bus before they came here.
And their women? all whores."
"What about Rumanians?" Sam threw in obligingly.
"All thieves," said Meier.
"They say all Hungarians are bald", said Sam,
and raised his eyes to the heavens.
Meier ignored him.
"We must forge one nation," he said.
"We must weld the youth into one nation."
"Why?" said Sam. "How?" said Sam.
"In the fire," Meier went on.
"In the heat of battle, we will become one nation.
Under King Solomon, Israel was a great nation,
rich and powerful. One day she will be so again."
Sam sighed. "We are Jews," he said.
"Why should our children turn into Israelis?"
"History loves a winner," said Meier.
"No more guilt. No more fear.
No more being strangers.
No more being different."
"I like being different," Sam said, throwing his arms out.
"I want to be different."
Meier stood up and pointed a thick finger and yelled,
"He thinks he's funny. This Jew thinks he's funny.
No wonder they fed you into the gas ovens."

Do you remember?
the day the Bedouins came to town
I still remember
the women waiting still as stone
their silent shapes cocooned in black
against the whitewashed walls that echoed back the sun
to blind the eyes
ghosts from another world

across the desert,
the road carved southward to the Red Sea through the desert
a cratered moonscape made of sand.
we saw the burning fists of rock
and felt the wind that sucked us dry
and heard those urging, stirring songs:
always new lands to tame

Meier like telling stories of how,
in the War of Independence, he blew up Arab houses.
He knew Sam would become agitated.
It would turn Sam inside out.
"It was not true," he said, "you did not do that."
"Why not?" said Meier, "Facts.
Now there's nothing left for them to return to.
only stones. Let them find homes with their own kind."
"I want nothing to do with such facts," said Sam.
"Where would you be without them?" sneered Meier.
"we made this country," he said. "Before us, what was there?
Marshland, desert.
The promise was to us: the desert shall blossom like a rose."
"They were people," said Sam, "like us, with hopes and dreams."
"Hopes, dreams." Meier spat the words out.
"You think you can buy the future with dreams?"
And he took a pile of notes from his pocket
and threw them on the table.
"There," he said. "Facts, Money. Don't give me your dreams."
Sam turned away and began to find a dance with his feet,
like a child taking its first steps
while Mahalia sang on,
her voice intense with the joy and pain of believing.
But Meier wasn't finished.
"This man is full of dreams," he taunted, "full of could-have-beens:
a dancer he could have been. A mime artist he could have been."
"It's true," said Sam, as he moved and swayed to the music.
"I could have been a great mime artist."
and slowly, his mournful face upturned and his hands outstreched,
he wove a strange shuffling dance,
around the pillers and the wheels and the homemade stools,
round the stolen signpost indicatingRumna 45 kilometers away,
round the lacquered stones and pieces of driftwood
twisted, gnarled and desolated by the wind and the waves.
Meier's stone bald head seemed to swell with fury.
"Displaying himself," he said contemptously. "Where's the dignity?"
And he pushed aside his congac and pulled himself to his feet
and picked up a stone and gripped it in his bunched fist
and in his eyes was a peculiar sort of hatred.
And suddenly, the jangle of noise, the chattering, the shouting,
the laughing, fell away to a whisper; everyone turned to watch.
There was only the sound of Mahalia singing
and the shuffling steps of Sam's dance.
Could we have guessed then how it would be?
Could we have seen then in Meier's eyes those certainties,
Facts: the houses torn apart, the torture, the weeping,
the children burning, the fragmentation bombs, the phosphorous bombs.
Facts: The shortest distance between the past and the future.
But we saw only Meier, stone in his fist,
and waited in silence for what he would do.
"Sit down," he said in a low voice, "sit down."
Then he hurled the stone with all his force,
not at Sam exactly, but still, at him
It smashed against a pillar and clattered to the floor.
Sam froze, stopped dancing.
A silent shake in the candle gloom.
his mournful face crumpled and yellow
It seemed to us he was about to cry,
then he put his arms about his head as if to protect himself,
turning in on himself.
"I want to go home," he said. "I want to go home."

They came from nowhere.
The lost the broken and the mad, as if from nowhere
they blundered in like blind invaders
while Mahalia boomed a gospel song and candles blurred the gloom.
they drank and argued till the dawn had drained the night away.

It was The Last Chance.
It was a nightclub in the desert called The Last Chance
a cluttered dive of stones and wheels
it was a refuge for the rootless of the world
washed up like driftwood on the sand
And we were there.
it was so long ago.

Thursday Verses: The Nurse's Song

We've been reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator by Roald Dahl. After an evening of reading political blogs and contemplating our present predicament, my spouse suggested this as a suitable poetic offering. I agree. This was published in 1972, so it was written when Bush hadn't even started going AWOL yet. And, despite this warning, here we are.

You can find a plot summary to put it in context here, and I stole the text from here.

The Nurse's Song

This mighty man of whom I sing,
The greatest of them all,
Was once a teeny little thing,
Just eighteen inches tall.

I knew him as a tiny tot,
I nursed him on my knee.
I used to sit him on the pot
And wait for him to wee.

I always washed between his toes,
And cut his little nails.
I brushed his hair and wiped his nose
And weighed him on the scales.

Through happy childhood days he strayed,
As all nice children should.
I smacked him when he disobeyed,
And stopped when he was good.

It soon began to dawn on me
He wasn't very bright,
Because when he was twenty-three
He couldn't read or write.

"What shall we do?" his parents sob.
"The boy has got the vapors!
He couldn't even get a job
Delivering the papers!"

"Ah-ha," I said, "this little clot
Could be a politician."
"Nanny," he cried, "Oh Nanny, what
A super proposition!"

"Okay," I said, "let's learn and note
The art of politics.
Let's teach you how to miss the boat
And how to drop some bricks,
And how to win the people's vote
And lots of other tricks.

Let's learn to make a speech a day
Upon the T.V. screen,
In which you never never say
Exactly what you mean.
And most important, by the way,
In not to let your teeth decay,
And keep your fingers clean."

And now that I am eighty nine,
It's too late to repent.
The fault was mine the little swine
Became the President.

Thursday Verses: The Uncultured Rhymer to His Cultured Critics

Thanks to Penny Richards for noting his birthday recently, and pointing me to this incredible archive of Lawson's work.

My students probably feel this way about me sometimes (I'm not a grammar nut, mind you, but I do believe in the value of clarity and evidence) but that doesn't mean that I can't feel this way about other figures in my life.

The Uncultured Rhymer To His Cultured Critics
By Henry Lawson (1910)

Fight through ignorance, want, and care —
Through the griefs that crush the spirit;
Push your way to a fortune fair,
And the smiles of the world you’ll merit.
Long, as a boy, for the chance to learn —
For the chance that Fate denies you;
Win degrees where the Life-lights burn,
And scores will teach and advise you.
My cultured friends! you have come too late
With your bypath nicely graded;
I’ve fought thus far on my track of Fate,
And I’ll follow the rest unaided.
Must I be stopped by a college gate
On the track of Life encroaching?
Be dumb to Love, and be dumb to Hate,
For the lack of a college coaching?

You grope for Truth in a language dead —
In the dust ’neath tower and steeple!
What know you of the tracks we tread?
And what know you of our people?
‘I must read this, and that, and the rest,’
And write as the cult expects me? —
I’ll read the book that may please me best,
And write as my heart directs me!

You were quick to pick on a faulty line
That I strove to put my soul in:
Your eyes were keen for a ‘dash’ of mine
In the place of a semi-colon —
And blind to the rest. And is it for such
As you I must brook restriction?
‘I was taught too little?’ I learnt too much
To care for a pedant’s diction!

Must I turn aside from my destined way
For a task your Joss would find me?
I come with strength of the living day,
And with half the world behind me;
I leave you alone in your cultured halls
To drivel and croak and cavil:
Till your voice goes further than college walls,
Keep out of the tracks we travel!

Thursday Verses: Knots

(I know it's not Thursday yet, but I'm going to be busy tomorrow. Also for most of the weekend, so I won't be doing much blog stuff 'til next week)

Reminds me of teaching, especially in that first year.

"Knots" (1970)
- R. D. Laing [via]

There is something I don't know
that I am supposed to know.
I don't know what it is I don't know,
and yet I am supposed to know,
And I feel I look stupid
if I seem both not to know it
and not know what it is I don't know.
Therefore, I pretend I know it.
There is nerve-wracking since I don't
know what I must pretend to know.
Therefore, I pretend I know everything.

Thursday Lyric: Magic Muffin Dance

Christy's long-time partner (spouse in all but law, of course) Boda was kind enough to send the words along to my favorite of Christy's originals. It's such a charming little tune, too: lilting and bouncy; it's a bit hard to join in at first, but it's so irresistable once you get the rhythm of it.

This song has always reminded me of Stan Rogers' description of Archie Fisher's "Witch of the Westmorland" as "a five hundred year old legend that Archie made up." It has that wonderful faerie tale quality that's almost timeless.

Magic Muffin Dance
words and music by Christy Simpson
copyright1996

As you probably know, bunnies don’t wear clothes
They’re wrapped in fur to their little rabbit toes
It’s an old tradition, it’s a wondrous sight
When the Muffin Dance begins in the sparkle of the night for…

Seven lucky bunnies (x6)
Doing the Magic Muffin Dance.

Well, they measure out the flour and they measure out the sugar
They count out the eggs and they mix it all together
They add a little magic, pour the batter in the pans
They cook ‘em in the oven and get ready for the dance. They’re

Seven lucky bunnies (x6)
Doing the Magic Muffin Dance.

Well, one is a sister of a brother of a cousin
Of an aunt who lives in the nearby wood.
She eats all her carrots and she does her bunny chores
She knows she’ll be chosen if she is good. One of…

Seven lucky bunnies (x6)
Doing the Magic Muffin Dance.

Well, they dance to the music of the silvery night
They dance to the stars and the pale moonlight
They dance to the water as it rushes down the stream
They dance to the rhythm and the music of your dreams. They’re…

Seven lucky bunnies (x6)
Doing the Magic Muffin Dance.

They dance in a circle and they dance in a square.
They dance with all four feet in the air.
They dance in a line and they dance in a heap
They dance with all their hearts and then they fall asleep. They’re…

Seven lucky bunnies (x6)
Doing the Magic Muffin Dance.

ending (counterpoint with chorus): one bunny, two bunnies, three bunnies, four bunnies, five bunnies, six bunnies, seven bunnies doing the Magic Muffin Dance.

You were loved

Christy Simpson has left us. Barely fifty years old, she had a career as a pediatric intensive care nurse, a calling as a singer/songwriter, and a warm soul. I got to know her because I married a friend of hers, and those too-rare visits were always sweet moments.

In addition to losing a friend, we've had to explain things a bit to the Little Anachronism: it's the first time anyone has died whose music is a presence in our home and (though it was too long ago to have made an impression on a growing brain) who the little one got to visit in person. On the other hand, we've been bringing up Christy's music again; it's been too long.

My favorite of her songs is "The Magic Muffin Dance" (aka "Seven Lucky Bunnies"), but it's a bear to transcribe. Here's one I can do more quickly:

Know That I am loved.
by Christy Simpson

I've got a cat. He's black and white
Sometimes he wakes me up in the middle of the night
His name is Joshua, and he wants a drink, he hops right up into the bathroom sink.
He purrs and then I turn the water on and I know I'm loved

I've got a dog: we walk each day
She eats things off the ground: it's like a big buffet
She's always glad to see me when I've been away
Five minutes, and hour or a very long day.
She wags her tail and she smiles at me and I know I'm loved

I've got a bear: her name is mabel
She spends most of her time on my bedside table
When I go on a trip she always comes along
She's polite and listens when I sing my song.
She lets me squeeze her tight in the middle of the night
I know I'm loved

My mom and dad live far away
Sometimes they call on the telephone just to say
"The weather is cold. We've got the flu.
Between the zoo and the aquarium there's lots to do,
We miss you and honey, we're so proud of you."
then I know I'm loved

I've got a best friend: her name is Boda
Sometimes we sit and talk and we share a soda
She lets me cry when I feel sad, and when she hugs me tight it doesn't seem so bad
We laugh and play, it sends my blues away, and I know I'm loved

So if you're feeling alone
If you're feeling kind of blue
Well, here's a little something that you might do:
Take a look around at the folks you know and consider all the little things they do to show you that you're special, and you'll know you're loved. (2x)


It's a simple message, but it's exactly the kind of song that works: the simple message is set in concrete details -- real ones, mostly -- which make it come alive. Christy also set Shel Silverstein's They've Put a Brassiere on the Camel to music, and makes it her own in the process. Yes, both songs are on the same CD.

Thursday Verses: Doing Nothing

Heard this morning on Garrison Keilor's Writer's Almanac. He's rarely political in that venue, and this isn't explicitly political, either. It's just a meditation on a moment of human life, and I've been there, too.

Doing Nothing
by Dan Gerber from A Primer on Parallel Lives. © Copper Canyon Press.

When I passed him near the bus stop
on Union Square while the cops
cuffed his hands behind his back, while he
said, "I didn't do anything,"
I didn't, either,
do anything but look away,
a little afraid they might cuff me
if I paid too much attention,
and walked on still wondering
what he might've done
and still more what I
might've done.

I am Tanka

I am the tanka. The attention of others Is unnerving, and Since I try not to draw it, I'm left alone. Which is good. What Poetry Form Are You? [via]

My second choice, according to the quiz, was haiku. Nothing long, mind you. I wonder if limerick was an option?

Thursday Verses: Binary Addendum

Normally I don't post excerpts, but this is just too good. LiveJournal conventions seem to require requesting permission to repost things, and ozarque's really busy this week, so I'll just give you the teaser and the link.

Binary Addendum
by Suzette Haden Elgin

On that day when -- suddenly -- God Almighty,
at the farthest narrow extreme of all patience,
inflicted sanity upon the United States Congress....
[read the rest here]

Thursday Lyric: Muddy Water

We recently got a new copy of an old Seldom Scene album (Live at the Cellar Door, pretty much the essential Seldom Scene disk) which has a fantastic version of this fundamentally haunting and beautiful song. Lyrics courtesy of Mudcat Cafe.

Muddy Water
by Phil Rosenthall

Mary, take the baby, river's risin
That muddy water's takin back the land
This old frame house won't take one more beating
Ain't no time to stay and make a stand

Mornin light shows water in the valley
My daddy's grave just went below the line
Things to save, you just can't take em with you
Mud'll swallow all you leave behind

I won't be back to start all over
What I felt before is gone
Mary take the baby, river's rising
Muddy water's takin back our home

Roads are gone, there's just one way to leave here
Turn my back on what I left below
Shiftin lands and broken farms around me
Muddy water's changin all I know

Hard to say just what I'm losin
I ain't never felt so all alone
Mary, take the baby, river's risin
That muddy water's takin back our home

Thursday Lyric: Presidential Rag

For Hanukkah, my spouse got me a CD of an old favorite, Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie, "Together in Concert" and I was struck by how apropos this Watergate-era song is for today. Think about the scandals and the administration's failure to respond to them, and the utter wrongness of the overarching policy which the scandals support....

Presidential Rag
by Arlo Guthrie

You said you didn't know,
that the cats with the bugs were there,
and you never go along with that kind of stuff no where,
but that just isn't the point man,
that's the wrong wrong way to go,
if you didn't know about that one, well then what else don't you know?

You said that you were lied to,
well that ain't hard to see,
but you must have been fooled again by your friends across the sea,
and maybe you were fooled again by your people here at home,
because nobody could talk like you,
and know what's going on

Nobody elected your family,
and we didn't elect your friends,
no one voted for your advisors,
and nobody wants amends,
You're the one we voted for, so you must take the blame,
For handing out authority to men who are insane

You say its all fixed up now, you've got new guys on the line,
but you had better remember this while you still got the time,
Mothers still are weeping for their boys that went to war,
father still are asking what the whole damn thing was for,
and people still are hungry and people still are poor,
An honest week of work these days don't feed the kids no more,
Schools are still like prisons,
Cuz we don't learn how to live,
and everybody wants to take, nobody wants to give

Yes you will be remembered, be remembered very well,
and if I live a long life, all the stories I could tell,
Of men who are in poverty of sickness and of grief,
Hell yes, you will be remembered,
be remembered very well

You said you didn't know,
that the that the cats with the bugs were there,
You'd never go along with that kind of stuff no where
But that just isn't the point man,
That's the wrong ,wrong way to go,
You didn't know about that one,
well then what else don't you know.

Thursday Lyric Addendum: Ballad of The Carpenter

Apparently some of my friends didn't feel this was in the proper spirit; it does represent a heretical tradition, and it's by the same man who wrote about this Christian movement. In fairness, it represents one of my many feelings about the history and theology of Christianity, and, given the current discourse of traitorousness in this country, needed to be aired.

I've always thought it would be an interesting exercise, in an intro history or historiography course, to pair "Stand Up For Judas" with the following, the leftist revisioning of the Gospels I grew up with. Hope this helps.

The Ballad Of The Carpenter
by Phil Ochs

Jesus was a working man
And a hero you will hear
Born in the town of Bethlehem
At the turning of the year
At the turning of the year

When Jesus was a little lad
Streets rang with his name
For he argued with the older men
And put them all to shame
He put them all to shame

He became a wandering journeyman
And he traveled far and wide
And he noticed how wealth and poverty
Live always side by side
Live always side by side

So he said "Come you working men
Farmers and weavers too
If you would only stand as one
This world belongs to you
This world belongs to you"

When the rich men heard what the carpenter had done
To the Roman troops they ran
Saying put this rebel Jesus down
He's a menace to God and man
He's a menace to God and man

The commander of the occupying troops
Just laughed and then he said
"There's a cross to spare on Calvaries hill
By the weekend he'll be dead
By the weekend he'll be dead"

Now Jesus walked among the poor
For the poor were his own kind
And they'd never let them get near enough
To take him from behind
To take him from behind

So they hired one of the traders trade
And an informer was he
And he sold his brother to the butchers men
For a fistful of silver money
For a fistful of silver money

And Jesus sat in the prison cell
And they beat him and offered him bribes
To desert the cause of his fellow man
And work for the rich men's tribe,
To work for the rich men's tribe

And the sweat stood out on Jesus' brow
And the blood was in his eye
When they nailed his body to the Roman cross
And they laughed as they watched him die
They laughed as they watched him die

Two thousand years have passed and gone
Many a hero too
But the dream of this poor carpenter
Remains in the hands of you
Remains in the hands of you

Thursday Verses

An occasional series of music lyrics and poetry, inspired by Hugo Schwyzer

My writings
2005 January 14: Teaching Haiku
2005 July 14: Home Repair Haiku
2005 August 23: Political Limerick: Shorter Kieran Healy
2005 November 13: Stick Your Finger In God's Eye
2006 February 16: Vermin Haiku
2006 April 16: Fibonacci Poems
2006 April 16: A Simple Truth (Fib)
2006 May 26: four haiku, one of which won an eCherry
2006 June 24: A quick and dirty limerick in honor of the return of a poetry carnival.
2008 October 9: Current Events Sonnet
2008 December 20: Haiku, Limerick and Fib in honor of Terry's fourth blogiversary.

Other People:
2004 Nov 25: Thanksgiving Eve by Bob Franke
2004 Dec 2: After The Singing by Rod MacDonald
2005 Feb 3: Don't You Let Nobody Turn You 'Round by Tom Paxton
2005 March 17: The Shame of Going Back by Henry Lawson
2005 April 22: Hills of West Virginia by Phil Ochs
2005 May 5: Malcolm Solves His Problems With A Chainsaw by the Arrogant Worms
2005 May 19: World Turned Upside Down by Leon Rosselson
2005 June 2: The Kind of Love You Never Recover From by Christine Lavin
2005 June 16: Delivery Delayed by Stan Rogers
2005 June 23: Why Walk When You Can Fly by Mary-Chapin Carpenter
2005 June 28: Green Hills of Earth by Robert Heinlein
2005 July 7: After All by Henry Lawson
2005 July 21: If I Were Taken Now by Fred Small
2005 August 11: Don't Think Twice, It's All Right by Bob Dylan
2005 August 18: The Old Sailor by A.A.Milne
2005 August 25: Turning Toward the Morning by Gordon Bok
2005 September 15: The Dodger Song
2005 September 22: For Everyman by Jackson Browne
2005 October 6: Adon Olam by Solomon Rossi (16-17c)
2005 October 20: White Squall by Stan Rogers
2005 November 10: Questions from A Worker Who Reads by Bertolt Brecht
2005 November 17: Suzanne by Leonard Cohen
2005 December 1: Their Way by Bob Blue
2005 December 8: Don Quixote by Gordon Lightfoot
2005 December 15: Great Historical Bum by Woody Guthrie
2005 December 22: That's the Way That the World Goes 'Round by John Prine
2006 January 19: Waiting for the B Train by Christine Lavin
2006 January 28: Guantanamera by José Martí
2006 February 8: Waking the Dead By Joe Ivory Mattingly
2006 February 9: This Looks Familiar by Gonzo
2006 February 13: Mr. Blue by Tom Paxton
2006 February 23: Zen Gospel Singing by Mark Graham
2006 March 2: Brown Shirts by John Gorka
2006 March 23: Song of the Candle by Stan Rogers
2006 April 20: Poem for My Little Boy by Li Shangyin
2006 May 18: Number One in America by David Massengill
2006 June 15: Arrow by Cheryl Wheeler
2006 June 22: Canadian Railroad Trilogy by Gordon Lightfoot
2006 September 7: Stormfront by Garnet Rogers
2006 September 27: In Broken Images by Robert Graves
2006 October 5: Montreal, December '89 by Judy Small
2006 November 8: Alleluia, The Great Storm Is Over by Bob Franke
2006 November 23: Love's Been Linked To The Blues by David Olney
2006 December 7: Stand Up For Judas by Leon Rosselson
2006 December 9: Ballad of The Carpenter by Phil Ochs
2006 December 22: Presidential Rag by Arlo Guthrie
2007 March 22: Muddy Water by Phil Rosenthall
2007 March 29: Binary Addendum by Suzette Haden Elgin
2007 April 26: Doing Nothing by Dan Gerber
2007 May 1: Know that I am Loved by Christy Simpson
2007 May 10: Magic Muffin Dance by Christy Simpson
2007 June 13: Knots by R. D. Laing
2007 July 19: The Uncultured Rhymer to His Cultured Critics by Henry Lawson
2007 December 6: The Nurse's Song by Roald Dahl
2008 March 13: The Last Chance by Leon Rosselson
2008 May 27: "Moose Turd Pie" and "The Hymn Song" by U. Utah Phillips.