Poor Babes:


When I was little and I would stay with my grandparents I would occasionally wake up in the middle of the night and get frightened because I couldn't remember where I was or how I got there. That strange sensation still occurs when camping out at a friends place or some odd hotel. If you think about it, you are most vulnerable while sleeping and I feel that it must be some internal way of keeping you safe from harm. Anyway my grandmother would peek into the room then sit by the bed and sing me back to sleep with this lullaby;

"Oh don't you remember a long time ago
two poor little babes whose names I don't know
were stolen away one bright sunny day
and left in the woods, so I've heard people say

They tried and they tried to get out they cried
those poor little babes they laid down and died
and when they were dead the robin so red
brought strawberry leaves and over them spread"

Thanks Grandma! Now I'm going to have nightmares.

In some way it was oddly comforting and to this day when I wake in a strange place I sing the tune until I fall back asleep.

7 comments:

  1. Yikes! Scary stuff. I did not know this one. Found this version.

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  2. Goodness...It's almost like you were raised in an enchanted fairy forest in the 1300s!

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  3. My mother's mother (whom I adored) had the same sort of "Toughen up, you little sissy" attitude towards my delicate sensibilities.

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  4. There's no monster under the bed.
    He's there, in the closet. Nighty night.

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  5. we're a strange bunch, sweetpea! singing to frightened children about getting left in the woods and dying. maybe it was supposed to be the sound of her voice that was supposed to calm you...

    *shrug* i'm still a very light sleeper in hotels or when i'm not in my own bed. xoxoxoxo

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  6. That was a lovely sentiment Ayem8y. I might have it embroidered on a tapestry to hang above my bed alongside the portrait of Myra Hindley.

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  7. I just scream a bit and grab my balls.

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