Tuesday, July 18, 2006


At last!
Time and the high hot summer sun have given us lilies!

One small oval garden spot is dedicated to early spring blooms ~~~ tulips , narcissus, columbine & poppy. After that comes ethereal dancing daisey white & tall.
Then we watch and wait as lily's foliage becomes lushly green and the buds pregnant with color fairly burst from the pods.


Yesterday's unveiling: the first Pink Lily of the season.

And so in tribute to Lily, the Pink, I present here a children's lyric from the 1960's .
I love it!

Somewhat irreverant, amuzing and whimsical, and not at all descriptive of the "romance" of my garden's lily, it is actually an ode to Lydia Pinkham's potion or "compound.

LILY THE PINK

We'll drink a drink a drink
To Lily the Pink the Pink the Pink
The saviour of the human race
For she invented medicinal compound
Most efficacious in every case.

Mr. Frears
Had sticky-out ears
And it made him awful shy
And so they gave him medicinal compound
And now he's learning how to fly.

Brother Tony
Was notably bony
He would never eat his meals
And so they gave him medicinal compound
Now they move him round on wheels.

[Chorus]

Old Ebeneezer
Thought he was Julius Caesar
And so they put him in a Home
Where they gave him medicinal compound
And now he's Emperor of Rome.

Johnny Hammer
Had a terrible ss..ss..ss..ss..ss..ss..stammer
He could hardly s..s..say a word
And so they gave him medicinal compound
Now he's seen (but never 'eard)!

[Chorus]

Auntie Millie
Ran willy-nilly
When her legs, they did recede
And so they rubbed on medicinal compound
And now they call her Millipede.

Jennifer Eccles
Had terrible freckles
And the boys all called her names
But she changed with medicinal compound
And now he joins in all their games.

[Chorus]

Lily the Pink, she
Turned to drink, she
Filled up with paraffin inside
and despite her medicinal compound
Sadly Picca-Lily died.

Up to Heaven
Her soul ascended
All the church bells they did ring
She took with her medicinal compound
Hark the herald angels sing
.

Credit for growing these lovelies pink lilies goes to Larry-of-the-green-thumb.
The lyric can be found at http://www.mum.org/Mrspink1.htm

"I'm sure that someone may already have told you about this, but there was a "pop" group in the 1960's in Britain called "Scaffold" whose main claim to fame was that one of them was Paul McCartney's brother and one was the Liverpool poet Roger McGough. However, they had a long-running number one hit with what most people took to be a children's song called LILY THE PINK."





2 comments:

Unknown said...

Pat, you need to go over to Deepwater Journal and see the prayer and painting Robin did for you!

Dina

http://deepwaterjournal.blogspot.com/

Anonymous said...

The pink lillies have popped up in my garden too, aren't they beautiful?