Two Elephants

(a children's song)

Once there went two elephants
For a walk on a summer's day.
One of them's name was Clarence,
Whilst the other one's name was Ray.

So Ray he says to Clarence,
To Clarence (to him) he said,
"Begun to dislike my colour
And I'm thinkin' of paintin' me red."

"Ah, so," said he (said Clarence),
"I tend toward the colour green,
So I can hang by my trunk from a tree
And disguise myself as a bean."

"Oh yes!" says Ray to Clarence,
"That's a very good trick, I agree.
Thinks that I'll paint myself blue
And be disguised as the Caspian Sea."

"Ah so," said he (said Clarence),
Said Clarence to him (to Ray),
"We'll paint us both those colours
Instead of this elephant gray!"

So they painted them both those colours
And were thus for a year and a day,
When the Caspian Sea overflowed in a flood
And the bean got carried away.

ls-1970
Originally published in Melange, 1971