See me and me cousins – old Daryl and Bede,

We sat on the porch at the front of our home,

We used to laze ‘round, have a drink and a feed,

Coz we had to make sure them cows didn’t roam.

 

Some say folk in the sticks have so little to do,

They say we have plenty of time on our hands,

But now we are part of the active crew few,

Coz for whittlin’ we are the biggest of fans.

 

We started to whittle the odd gum tree stick,

Carvin’ them sticks into nothin’ much at all,

But then after a while we gave sticks the big flick,

Coz there weren’t any more on the trees to fall.

 

We then took to whittlin’ all the wood that we found

(I know you must think this is pretty outrageous),

And all that was left were some chips on the ground,

As whittlin’ for us was becomin’ highly contagious!

 

So we called for whittlin’ help from all of our relos,

(There are lots, as not much happens in them hills),

Whittlin’ was now a big job for gals and the fellows,

Coz we were sellin’ more chips than them log cuttin’ mills.

 

Now as we’re all whittlin’, I gets to do some thinkin’,

Started to make up a tune for all of us to know,

A song ‘bout whittlin’ that would get us all a hootin’,

Let’s call it: ‘From Big Things, Little Things Grow’!

 

And thought all big words could do with a whittle,

Cut them down to size, get rid of the word pith,

It would make them word books be ever so little,

For doin’ this craft, they’ll call us a ‘wordsmith’!

 

Back from my thoughts to our whittlin’ adventure,

There’s not much wood left as you look around,

Gone are fences, the house door and its wood floor,

And there’s none of them trees still growin’ on the ground.

 

Hey, we might of overdone the extent of our wood work,

May be we couldn’t see ‘the forest for the trees’,

But we’ve just heard some news that made us all smirk:

There are lots of big trees in Brazil that are free!