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Songs of Innocents – The Chimney Sweeper
When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry `weep! `weep! `weep! `weep!
So your chimneys I sweep, and in soot I sleep.
There`s little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head,
That curled like a lamb`s back, was shaved: so I said,
"Hush, Tom! never mind it, for when your head`s bare,
You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair."
And so he was quiet; and that very night,
As Tom was a-sleeping, he had such a sight, -
That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, and Jack,
Were all of them locked up in coffins of black.
And by came an angel who had a bright key,
And he opened the coffins and set them all free;
Then down a green plain leaping, laughing, they run,
And wash in a river, and shine in the sun.
Then naked and white, all their bags left behind,
They rise upon clouds and sport in the wind;
And the angel told Tom, if he`d be a good boy,
He`d have God for his father, and never want joy.
And so Tom awoke; and we rose in the dark,
And got with our bags and our brushes to work.
Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy and warm;
So if all do their duty they need not fear harm.
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