A Book of Nonsense

Song Cycle by Gary Bachlund (b. 1947)

1. The Dwarf of Battersea
 (Sung text)

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2. Little Spider
 (Sung text)

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3. O Little Fly
 (Sung text)

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4. 'It Worries Me to Know'
 (Sung text)

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It worries me to know
 . . . . . . . . . .

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5. How Fly the Birds of Heaven
 (Sung text)

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6. Of Pygmies, Palms and Pirates
 (Sung text)

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Of pygmies, palms and pirates,
Of islands and lagoons,
Of blood-bespotted frigates,
Of crags and octoroons,
Of whales and broken bottles,
Of quicksands cold and grey,
Of ullages and dottles,
I have no more to say.

Of barley, corn and furrows,
Of farms and turf that heaves
Above such ghostly burrows
As twitch on summer eves
Of fallow-land and pasture,
Of skies both pink and grey,
I made my statement last year
And have no more to say.

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7. An Old and Crumbling Parapet
 (Sung text)

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8. It Is Most Best
 (Sung text)

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9. O'er Seas That Have No Beaches
 (Sung text)

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10. 'Come, Break the News to Me, Sweet Horse'
 (Sung text)

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Come, break the news to me, sweet horse
 . . . . . . . . . .

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11. An Angry Cactus Does No Good
 (Sung text)

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12. I Cannot Give You Reasons
 (Sung text)

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I cannot give the reasons,
I only sing the tunes:
the sadness of the seasons
the madness of the moons.

I cannot be didactic
or lucid, but I can
be quite obscure and practic-
ally marzipan

In gorgery and gushness
and all that's squishified.
My voice has all the lushness
of what I can't abide

And yet it has a beauty
most proud and terrible
denied to those whose duty
is to be cerebral.

Among the antlered mountains
I make my viscous way
and watch the sepia mountains
throw up their lime-green spray.

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13. The Trouble With Geraniums
 (Sung text)

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The trouble with geraniums
is that they're much too red!
The trouble with my toast is that
it's far too full of bread.

The trouble with a diamond
is that it's much too bright.
The same applies to fish and stars
and the electric light.

The troubles with the stars I see
lies in the way they fly.
The trouble with myself is all
self-centred in the eye.

The trouble with my looking-glass
is that it shows me, me;
there's trouble in all sorts of things
where it should never be.

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14. Crocodiles
 (Sung text)

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She stared at him as hard as she
Could stare, but not a single blush
Suffused his face like dawn at sea
Or roses in a bush -

For crocodiles are very slow
At taking hints because their hide's
So thick it never feels de trop,
And tender like a bride's.

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15. O Love! O Death! O Ecstasy!
 (Sung text)

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O Love! O Death! O Ecstasy!
 . . . . . . . . . .

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16. O Here It Is! And There It Is!
 (Sung text)

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17. I Have My Price
 (Sung text)

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I have my price - it's rather high
(about the level of your eye)
but if you're nice to me I'll try
to lower it for you -
To lower it!

To lower it!
Upon the rope they knit
from yellow grass in Paraguay
where knitting is taboo.

Some knit them purl, some knit them plain
some knit their brows of pearl in vain.
Some are so plain, they try again
to tease the wool of love!
O felony in Paraguay
there's not a soul in Paraguay who's worth the dreamingof.
They say,
who's worth the dreaming of.

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18. Lean Sideways on the Wind
 (Sung text)

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19. Tintinnabulum
 (Sung text)

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20. The Hideous Root
 (Sung text)

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21. The Men in Bowler Hats Are Sweet
 (Sung text)

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22. Shrink, Shrink
 (Sung text)

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23. Aunty Jane
 (Sung text)

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24. Aunty Grace
 (Sung text)

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25. Uncle Wog
 (Sung text)

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26. Aunty Flo
 (Sung text)

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When Aunty Flo
Became a Crow
She had a bed put in a tree;
And there she lay
And read all day
Of ornithology.

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27. Aunty Vi
 (Sung text)

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28. Uncle Sam
 (Sung text)

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29. Aunty Nag
 (Sung text)

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30. Aunty Mig
 (Sung text)

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31. Aunty Jill
 (Sung text)

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32. Uncle Jake
 (Sung text)

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33. Crown Me With Hairpins
 (Sung text)

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34. Squat Ursula
 (Sung text)

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35. Leave the Stronger
 (Sung text)

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36. The Thread Remains
 (Sung text)

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37. The Adventures of Footfruit
 (Sung text)

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Total word count: 432