Diddu-Wah-Diddy
By john clare
All along the long Gum Swamp
Hear the rosin drip in the clay pots
The seeping from Osceola's pine stands
Slashes from the axe of the bent black men
In the stiffened breeches
Shirtless and oozing sweat with every gash
Singing in unison through the palmetto
"Boss man's ridin' by
Boss man's ridin' by
Look out, boy, look out!"
Looking past Taylor across the bank of the St Mary's
Into the shade of the mythical
Diddu-Wah-Diddy
Pllace of no work or worry
For man or beast
The way there so crooked
The mule pullin' the fodder wagon could eat from it
Place everyone would live
If only the road weren't so crooked and the route known
Today the rut road is black topped and easy is the straight way
Uncle Bud but a distant memory of when he left the state of old Virginia in the winter time;
"Where you guin nigger"?,they said.
"I'se guin to Flardi,
I'se guin to Flardi,
guin to Flardi to work
In de turpentine.
Guin to where all de curb stones is chairs
Guin to where all de food is already cooked
Baked chickens and sweet potato pies
with convenient knives and forks driftin' along cryin',
"Eat me! Eat me!"
Where the more you ate
The more remained."
But mostly the old turpentine men wound up settlin' for
Beluthahatchee
A land of forgetfulness
Where all was forgotten and forgiven
Unhitchin' the mule by the neat little shanty
In the sand swept yard with
Mammy and the chicken's scratchin' a livin'
This side of the crooked and
black St Mary's River.
