Mohammed Ali and Mushroom Bells

Come quick, don’t dilly-dally. Yessir, this you gotta see! Look out there in the valley, Lord, do my eyes deceive me? Ain’t that Mohammed Ali? And ain’t that a boxing ring, Roped ’round them trees? And he’s recitin’ something About butterflies and bees, When a mushroom bell went ding? While birds and critters scurried, Moving closer to ringside, As Ali strode unhurried, From his corner stool beside; Then he danced, jabbed and flurried. And them critters ooh’d and aah’d, Such a sight they’d never seen. It was poetry, by Gawd, A heavyweight there’d not been – Oh, so graceful and unflawed. There’d be no finer specimen, This champion of our youth; Beating odds time and again, We believed his brand of truth – And in the greatness of men. But in that far-away dell, We good critters heard the chimes Ringing from that mushroom bell. When slower became the rhymes – And softer became the yell. Till in your corner we sit, In this valley’s fading light, Thinking back to your fires lit When you showed us how to fight – And taught us how not to quit. So chanting, “Ali bomaye!” These mushroom bells we hear ring; And though time gets the last say, Here in the valley we’ll sing – Hailing what grew from the clay.