SAVANNA IDYL
If you’ve never heard a skylark sing
Johnny Mercer could tell you how.
Folks loved his songs.
I don’t know if they’re Savannah songs
but they were tarnished with a kind of silver
like a Savannah moon,
and love was like a dress
that sunshine shone through.
It was something the boy knew
and took away.
We love our people here.
Our houses may be a little chipped
but there’s pride in them.
And everybody knows everybody.
They’re just all clean in their selves.
The way sugar tastes,
or a girl gets made up with flowers.
So that’s what it’s like to be here.
Ever notice our trees?
Our magnolia trees?
All made up with lacquer, like furniture.
Something to see with those big blossoms!
I don’t know if there’s anything prettier,
like the faces of girls at cotillions,
like little queens.
But then if you don’t live things,
you don’t know how nice they are,
and how they always come back
when you’re lonely.
Like Johnny did when he wrote songs
and Savannah cried,
and skylarks flew through the trees
where everybody could see.