So an ice cream truck just drove by our house playing "Bury Me Not" in the tinkling bell style that is their wont. To appreciate the irony, I've reproduced the lyrics below:
"Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie." These words came sad and mournfully From the pallid lips of a youth who lay On his dying cot at the close of day.The cowboys gathered around his bed
To hear what their dying cowboy said.
"Oh, grant--oh, grant--this boon for me:
Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie."By my father's side let my bones be laid,
On the lone hillside in the maple's shade,
Where my friends may come and . . . me.
Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie."It matters not, so I've been told,
Where the body lies when the heart grows cold.
But grant--oh, grant--this dying . . . ,
Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie."Don't listen to enticing words
From men who own large groves and herds.
Oh, comrades brave, take warning, pray;
Don't leave your home for the lone prairie."Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie,
Where the wild coyotes will howl o'er me,
Where the rattlesnakes hiss and the wind sports free.
Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie."Oh, bury me not," and his voice failed there.
They paid no heed to his dying prayer.
In a narrow grave just six by three,
They laid him there on the lone prairie.
You can also listen to a 1959 recording (MP3) while trying to imagine what we just experienced.
