Wednesday, April 25, 2007
And other fancy stuff...
I remember when I was a kid that one of my siblings - I'm pretty sure it was my brother - had a windup clock that played the tune that these lyrics go to.
It is a tune that stayed with me over the years. My Mom told me the song had words, and she'd sing the first verse from time to time. As I've looked at older song lyrics over the past few years, I'm struck by the idea that the more "adult" our lyrics have become, the more juvenile the songs really are.*
I'm not sure where I got the wind-up clock I have now; I'm told it was THE clock, but I can't be sure. The clock I have was first produced in 1968, and my brother would have been 5, which strikes me as being too late. I don't think I would have played the clock over and over again as a ten year old. I remember forcing the action to make the tune speed up though...
The clock plays slowly and has obviously seen better days, but my four year old granddaughter winds it up and goes to sleep to the old tune some forty years later.
GRANDFATHER'S CLOCK
by Henry Clay Work
My grandfather's clock was too tall for the shelf,
So it stood ninety years on the floor
It was taller by half than the old man himself
Though it weighed not a penny weight more
It was bought on the morn of the day that he was born
And was always his treasure and pride
But it stopped, short, never to go again
When the old man died.
In watching its pendulum swing to and fro
Many hours had he spent while a boy
And in childhood and manhood the clock seem to know
And it shared both his grief and his joy
For it struck twenty-four when he entered at the door
With a blooming and beautiful bride
But it stopped, short, never to go again
When the old man died.
Ninety years without slumbering (tick, tock, tick, tock)
Its life seconds numbering (tick, tock, tick tock)
But it stopped, short, never to go again
When the old man died.
My grandfather said that of those he could hire
Not a servant so faithful he found
For it wasted no time and had but one desire
At the close of each week to be wound.
And it kept in its face not a frown upon its face
And its hand never hung by its side
But it stopped, short, never to go again
When the old man died.
Ninety years without slumbering (tick tock, tick tock)
Its life seconds numbering (tick tock, tick tock
But it stopped, short, never to go again
When the old man died.
You can listen to the tune here.
Work was also the composer of "Marching Through Georgia."
*Of course I know that there were risque versions of popular songs. Kind of hard to do that with a modern lyric...
Labels: blather
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