Hi Azizi,

Great work. If that line is "Oh cry, oh cry, oh meadowlark," that makes a lot of sense, and helps put the second line in perspective. Wouldn't a meadowlark keeping geese have a connotation, sexual or otherwise, of a little bird either gaining big power, or reaching way too high, depending on your viewpoint?

By the way I remember seeing Meadowlark Lemon play with the Globetrotters on TV in the 1950s. I was also lucky enough to catch a TV glimpse of Bill "Bojangles" Robinson dancing before his retirement. I treasure those memories. Both were astonishing—men of grace, character and the kind of performance that just dazzles you to watch. Meadowlark, if I recall correctly (always an issue at my age), was said to be so deft nobody could lay a hand on him while he had the ball.

Larks and geese both occur quite frequently in Anglo-American folksong. Om African-American folksong and folklore geese are common, but offhand I don't recall any occurrence of larks there. The lark does occur in "Leatherwing Bat," also known as ""Hi, Said the Redbird" and "The Bird Song," which was sung by both races but probably white in origin. That's the only instance I can think of at the moment. There may be others, but not many, I think.

Dorothy Scarborough's "On the Trail of Negro Folk Songs" (1925) usefully has a whole chapter on songs about animals. Fox, dog, terrapin, toad, frog, horse, pony, mule, goat, snake, cat, alligator, bee, raccoon, possum, rabbit and so on are regularly sung about. Among birds, the jaybird and rooster / hen are most frequent, I think, also hawk, buzzard, woodpecker, mockingbird, redbird (cardinal) and certainly goose. Though Scarborough mentions a lark in the text, it doesn't seem to occur in any of the songs.

By the way, listening to "Mr. Mitchell," the "gooey parfait" line sounds quite clearly to me like:

I like your peach cobbler and your apple pie ...

Which makes sense in the context of his being a confectionery man.

Thanks for all your excellent work on this. (And extra thanks for bringing yourself to deal with it, because I know the material is not to your taste.)

I think we're getting there.

Bob