I found the song on this YouTube recording:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m166cbg6qUA

Here are the singer's notes:

I learned this song from wonderful folk musician, Betty Smith, in her 1977 June Appal recording of For My Friends of Song. I saw her performing in Baltimore in 1980 and am so glad I bought that album.

The album is available as a cassette:

http://www.bettysmithballads.com/bettysmithballads/friendsong.html

The Website also has interesting information about Betty Smith.

-Joe-

Might someone like to volunteer to make a MIDI of the melody? Send it to me at joe@mudcat.org







Here's the original poem by John Ciardi:

John Ciardi

There Once Was an Owl

There once was an Owl perched on a shed.
Fifty years later the Owl was dead.

Some say mice are in the corn.
Some say kittens are being born.

Some say a kitten becomes a cat.
Mice are likely to know about that.

Some cats are scratchy, some are not.
Corn grows best when it's damp and hot.

Fifty times fifty years go by.

Corn keeps best when it's cool and dry.

Fifty times fifty and one by one
Night begins when day is done.

Owl on the shed, cat in the clover,
Mice in the corn it all starts over.