A Christmas Insurrection

Words: Anne P. L. Field
Vocal Recordings: MP3 / OGG

Source: Christmas: Its Origin, Celebration and Significance as Related in Prose and Verse - Robert Haven Schauffler (1907)

In the hush of a shivery Christmas-tide dawn
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
Three small frozen figures hung stiff and forlorn
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
Three dim ghostly forms in the glimmering gray
Locked up in dark cold storage quarters were they
Awaiting the coming of glad Christmas day
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!

Suspended each one from a hickory twig
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
A turkey, a goose, and a little fat pig
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
With chestnuts the turkey was garnished and stuffed
With onions and sage was the goose-carcass puffed,
While piggy was spiced, and his neck was beruffed
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!

Three spirits regretful were hovering near
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
"Look!" gobbled the turkey's, "what tragedy's here!"
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
"For this did they tempt me with fattening food,
For this did I bring up my beautiful brood,
I always thought farmers uncommonly rude!"
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!

The goose spirit trembled, then hissingly said
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
"Most men care for nothing except to be fed!"
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
"What horror is this, filled with onions and sage
To be served on a platter at my tender age!
'Tis enough any well-disposed fowl to enrage!"
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!

The phantom pig grunted, "Do please look at that!"
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
"Oh! why did I grow up so rosy and fat!"
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
"They put in my mouth a sweet, juicy corncob
Just when of sensations my palate they rob,
Do you wonder such sights make a spirit-pig sob!"
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!

Conferring, the spirits resolved on a plan
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
By which to wreak vengeance on merciless man
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!
"We'll each disagree with the human inside,
We'll cause indigestion and damage his pride,
And the pains of this Christmas we'll spread far and wide!"
    Sing hey! sing ho! heigho!

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