UNDERNEATH THE PAWPAW TREE
Words & Music by Mark Howard Bowles
I was born, I was born,
I was born in the corner of a room.
I was born, I was born,
I was born by the fading light of a quarter moon.
Chorus:
I’m a little bit Viking, a little bit Gaul,
A touch of French and blue-eyed soul:
But they say I’m not an ounce of Cherokee.
I can sing a lullaby (make the young girls cry);
Put a tear in the old man’s eye.
I can be whatever I need to be.
And you can gawk at the way I walk;
You can mock the way I talk.
You can snicker and it won’t bother me:
I’ll have it made in the shade
With my pink lemonade;
I’ll be zonin’ underneath the Paw Paw tree.
Had a dog with mange and fleas
And a messy old Chinaberry tree.
We played Hearts and Army, marbles, Mumblypeg.
I shined boots and wingtip shoes,
Mowed the lawns and raked them too;
But I never could, ever could bring myself to beg.
I could sling your Johnson grass;
Wax your car, pump you gas;
Bring the Little Rock morning paper in the afternoon.
I could dig up a broken main,
Take a thorn, ignore the pain;
But I never could bring myself to eat racoon.
Short Instrumental:
I could lay tongue and groove floor,
Fix your porch or hang a door;
I could stain a stock or even blue a barrel.
I could sight a 303, gig a frog and thrash a tree
But I found I’d rather sing a Christmas carol.
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