The Funeral

[Verse 1]

I was walking in Savannah past a church, decayed and dim

When slowly through the window came a plaintive funeral hymn

And my sympathy awakened and a wonder quickly grew

'til I found myself environed in a little colored pew

Out front, a colored couple sat in sorrow, nearly wild

On the altar was a casket and in the casket was a child

I could picture him while living: curly hair, protruding lips

I'd seen perhaps a thousand in my hurried southern trips

Rose a sad, old colored preacher from his little wooden desk

With a manner sort of awkward and countenance grotesque

The simplicity and shrewdness in his Ethiopian face

Showed the wisdom and ignorance of a crushed, undying race

[Verse 2]

And he said, "Now, don't be weeping for this pretty bit of clay

For the little boy who lived there has done gone and run away

He was doing very finely and he appreciates your love

But his sure enough Father wanted him in the big house up above

The Lord didn't give you that baby, by no hundred thousand miles

He just think you need some sunshine and he lent it for a while

And he let you keep and love it 'til your hearts were bigger grown

And these silver tears you're shedding now is just interest on the loan

Just think, my poor dear mourners creeping long on sorrow's way

What a blessed picnic this here baby got today

Your good fathers and good mothers crowd the little fella 'round

In the angels' tender garden of the big plantation ground

And his eyes, they brightly sparkle at the pretty things he view

But a tear came and he whispered, "I want my parents too"

Then the angel's chief musicians teach that little boy a song

Says if only they be faithful, they'll soon be coming 'long

So, my poor detached mourners, let your hearts with Jesus rest

And don't go to criticizing the one what knows the best

He have give us many comforts, He's got the right to take away

To the Lord be praised in glory, forever, let us pray"