Re: [Harp-L] Watermelon Slim

[David Payne <dave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Brian, I'm glad you got the CD. Any money spent on a Watermelon CD or concert is money well spent. 

 It took some searching, but I actually found a copy of Watermelon's sonnet on Big Wheel Blues.com. A BIG part of this was his delivery, when people read a sonnet or some other poem with a constant meter, there is a natural tendency to read it as if you were skipping rope to a nursery rhyme. Watermelon does not have that problem. He reads it with Sir Lawrence Olivier technique, but with that Gabby Hayes voice of his. If you see him, see if he will recite it for you... and tell him Dave Payne says hey. 


Watermelon's Sonnet, written on the occasion of the death of the Queen Mother.

One of the last who would remember well 
Both of her England's twentieth-century wars, 
This queen, this mother, stood against the swell 
Of German pride and Nazism's mad force. 
This was a royal of an older day 
When dignity and noblesse stood for ought, 
And though the Law had circumscribed her sway 
For King and Queen and Country Britons fought. 
It must have been a pleasure to have known, 
Have lived, and laughed, and kept solemn with, her. 
A glorious part of history now is gone, 
A steady guidepost to the best we were. 
Oh England, for now, cry your decorous tears. 
But know the throne shall flourish through the years. 



___________________________
Dave Payne Sr.
Elk River Harmonicas
ww.elkriverharmonicas.com