Monday, June 19, 2006

All Things Prophetic, Tis Whiskey Me Boys


Let your quacks and newspapers be cuttin' their capers
And curing the vapors the scratch and the gout
With their medical potions, their pills and their lotions
Upholding their notions, they're mighty put out.

Who can tell the true physic of all things prophetic
And pitch to the divil, your cramps and your pee
You'll know it I think if you take a big drink
With your mouth to the brink of a jug of whiskey

So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For sinking your sorrows and raising your joys
Oh what moderation gives hope to a nation
Or brings consolation like whiskey me boys.

No liquid cosmetic to lovers athletic
Or bodies pathetic can give such a bloom
As the sweet by the powers in the garden of flowers
E'er gave their own bowers such a darling perfume

And this liquid so rare if you willingly share
To be taking your hair when it's frizzled and dead
Oh the sod has the merit to yield the true spirit
So strong it will shake all the hairs from your head

Then stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For sinking your sorrows and raising your joys
Oh since its perfection, no doctor's direction
Can cleanse the complexion like whiskey me boys

As a child in me cradle, me nurse with her ladle
Was filling my mouth with a notion of pap
When a drop from her bottle fell into my throttle
I stumbled and capered clean out of her lap

On the floor I lay crawlin' and screaming and bawling
'Til me mother and father were called to the fore
All sobbing and sighing they feared I was dying
But soon found I only was crying for more.

So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For sinking your sorrows and raising your joys
Oh lord how they'd chuckle if babes in their truckle
They only could suckle on whiskey me boys

Through my youthful aggression, through times of depression
My childhood's impression still clung to my mind
And at school or at college the basis of knowledge
I never could gulp 'til with whiskey combined

And as older I'm growing times ever bestowin'
On Erin's potation, a flavor so fine
And how ere they may lecture on jove and his nectar
Itself is the only true liquid divine

So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For sinking your sorrows and raising your joys
Oh lord, 'tis the right thing for courting and fighting
There's nowt so exciting as whiskey me boys.

Come guess me this riddle, what beats pipes and fiddle
What's hotter than mustard and milder than cream
What best wets your whistle, what's clearer than crystal
What's sweeter than honey and stronger than steam

What'll make the lame walk, what will make the dumb talk,
The elixir of life and philospher's stone
And what helped Mr. Brunel to build the Thames Tunnel
Wasn't it whiskey from ould Inishowen

So stick to the cratur' the best thing in nature
For sinking your sorrows and raising your joys
Oh lord, it's no wonder, if lightning and thunder
Weren't made from the plunder of whiskey me boys.

2 comments:

bigfoot chester said...

'tis true,
'tis true

Jennifer Finney Boylan said...

these are the lyrics to a song called "The Humours of Whiskey," which I think was written by Andy M. Stewart, a Scot, of all things. Still, it already feels "traditional" to me.

Maybe I should be careful how I use that word "still."

Above all this is intended to keep the spirit of the Sufferin Bastards alive until Himself returns from the parish of Pennsylvania and again takes up the serious business set before us herewith.

I should also be careful how I use that word 'spirit.'

JB