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by Elsie J. Cooley

If the trees knew
Language: English 
If the trees knew
how to run up and down the hill,
If the cats and dogs could talk
and we had to keep still,
If the flowers all should try
like birds to sing and fly,
And the birds were always found
growing up out of the ground,
Dear,
wouldn’t that be queer?
Dear, dear,
wouldn’t that be queer?
If the babies when they came
were very old and tall,
And grew down instead of up
to be quite young and small,
If the sun should come out bright
in the middle of the night,
And the dark should come and stay
when we knew that it was day,
Dear,
wouldn’t that be queer?
Dear, dear,
wouldn’t that be queer?

About the headline (FAQ)

Pulled from the score on IMSLP with the help of ChatGpt.

Text Authorship:

  • by Elsie J. Cooley , Boston: Arthur P. Schmidt, first published 1894, copyright status unknown [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

    [ None yet in the database ]


Researcher for this page: Annie Matan [Guest Editor]

This text was added to the website: 2026-01-23
Line count: 24
Word count: 121

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