Classic Poem

If I were a gay caballero,
And you were a fair Spanish maid,
I would doff you my plumed sombrero
And sing you my best serenade.

C HORUS .

Hay time, play time,
The sweet of the year is for you and me.

I would sing of your eyes in their brightness,
Of the lashes so long and so brown,
I would sing of your neck in its whiteness,
Your footstep so light and so strong.

Your voice in its freshness and sweetness,
The smile rippling over your face,
All the charm of your maiden completeness
Would find in my ballad a place.

But alas for sweet Fancy's armada,
And the dream-ships so fair and unreal,
For I am no son of Granada,
And you are no maid of Castile!

Yet to thee, my fair fellow-haymaker,
I would bring back the glad summer time,
With its charm of the pitcher and raker,
And weave all in sweet-scented rhyme!

Here's a song for those innocent blisses
When we cared not a fig for good form,
When we threw clover blossoms for kisses,
And captured the haycocks by storm!

So give me my straw hat for sombrero,
And with you in a green meadow glade,
And I'll envy no gay caballero,
Nor sigh for a fair Spanish maid.