Folk & Traditional Song Lyrics www.traditionalmusic.co.uk Baby-Rocking Medley (Rosalie Sorrels) 
Baby-Rocking Medley (Rosalie Sorrels) 
All right, it's 5:30 in the morning. That kid has not quit howling now for six hours. You're getting sort of desperate, breaking out into a cold sweat because you know that all those other kids are going to get up in about another half hour and they're going to demand cereal and peanut sandwiches and milk. And you forgot to get milk. Oh, God. All the paregoric is gone. It's gone because you drank it. Things are getting awful bad and you need something else. Every culture's got one: it's the hostile baby-rocking song. You just can't keep all that stuff bottled up inside yourself. You need to let it out some way, or you'd get strange . . . punch the baby in the mouth . . . and you can't do that. You'd get an awful big ticket for it, and it makes you feel lousy. So you take that baby and you rock it firmly, smile sweetly . . . and you sing the hostile baby-rocking song: 
This is the day we give babies away With a half a pound of tea You just open the lid, and out pops the kid With a twelve month guarantee. 
This is the day we give babies away With a half a pound of tea If you know any ladies who want any babies Just send them round to me 
There's an island where out in the sea Where babies grow up on the trees It's oh so much fun, to swing in the sun But you have to watch out if you sneeze, you sneeze You have to watch out if you sneeze 
You have to watch out if you sneeze 'Cause swinging up there in the breeze If you happen to cough, you might very well fall off And tumble down flop on your knees, your knees And tumble down flop on your knees. And when the stormy winds wail And the breezes blow up in a gale There's oh such a plopping and flopping and dropping And fat little babies just hail, just hail And fat little babies just hail. 
And the babies lie there in a pile And grownups come after a while And they always pass by any babies that cry They take only babies that smile, that smile Take triplets or twins if they'll smile 
There's an island where out in the sea Where babies grow up on the trees It's oh so much fun, to swing in the sun But you have to watch out if you sneeze, you sneeze You have to watch out if you sneeze 
DC, MC