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My Mother And My Sweetheart

by Loudon Wainwright III

on High Wide & Handsome: The Charlie Poole Project (2009)

A crowd of young fellows one night at a club
Were telling of sweethearts they had.
All of them jolly, except one young man,
Who seemed downhearted and sad.
"Come, Ned, won't you join us?"
His comrades then asked,
"For surely some girl has loved you."
Raising his head, he so proudly then said,
"Why, boys, I'm in love with two."

One has hair of silvery gray,
The other's is just like gold.
One is gay and youthful,
While the other is bent and old.
But dearer than life are they both to me -
From neither would I part.
One is my mother, God bless her,
I love her, the other is my sweetheart.

My sweetheart, you see, is a poor working girl,
The one I'm determined to wed.
My father says, "No, it can never be so,
Go marry an heiress instead."
I've won mother over, she knows how it is,
When father met her, she was poor.
She says, "Ned don't fret, she'll be your wife yet.
Your father will consent I am sure."

One has hair of silvery gray,
The other's is just like gold.
One is gay and youthful,
While the other is bent and old.
But dearer than life are they both to me -
From neither would I part.
One is my mother, God bless her,
I love her, the other is my sweetheart.