Classic Poem

Shingle Billet sawed in the Cypress Swamp,
At the Cypress root he raised;
Singing, he sawed till the sweat stood damp
On his head, and this oath he phrased:
" I'll be derned if I die in these juniper bogs
Where the ousel and pole cat dwell!
And saw and saw on these waterlogged logs
With a nigger as black as hell! "

He looked at the other end of the saw
Where the black man pulled it fro —
" My God! how black you have grown as you claw
That draw-saw, Hannibal Crow! "
" How I grow'd so black I do not know
And I feel like starting a fire;
I am black as hell, " said Hannibal Crow,
" And to burn am my desire. "

As they sawed again the flames shot out
And the negro went up in smoke.
And Shingle Billet all round about
Seemed roasting in blazing coke.
" I'll be blessed if I die till Hannibal Crow
Comes back in his chariot fire,
And I give him a Christian burial show
With his hard shell Baptist choir! "

He sang right out as the negroes train
When they to Baptism go,
And a voice came down with a shower of rain
That washed white Hannibal Crow;
Out went hell fire in the Cypress camp,
The pair sawed, singing again:
" There is nowhere else where the head gets damp
That the devil runs from a rain. "