My Mother And My Sweetheart

(album: 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