THE LITTLE CRIPPLED GIRL
Sung by: Mrs. Alberta Felts
Recorded in Batesville, AR 8/17/61

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In the yard where children were a-playing games one day,
A little tot with crutches was watching wishfully.
It seemed so hard she could not play as other children do.
They said that she would spoil their game, and was a baby, too.
Her tender heart was breaking, for they would not let her play.
As she goes to Mama, she murmurs painfully:
“Mama, when I go to Heaven will the angels let me play?
Just because I’m a cripple, will they say I’m in their way?
Children here never want me; I’m a bother, they say.
Mama, when I go to Heaven, will the angels let me play?”

“I am so tired, dear Mama,” the little darling said.
“Please rock me just a little, then put me to bed.
I wish Papa would come home before I go to sleep.
Please tell him how I’ve waited for his kiss upon my cheek.”

That night when all was silent, the angels came that way
And took the little darling, whose sweet lips seemed to say:
“Mama, when I go to Heaven, will the angels let me play?
Just because I’m a cripple, will they say I’m in their way?
Children here never want me; I’m a bother, they say.
Mother, when I go to Heaven, will the angels let me play?”

All Songs Recorded by John Quincy Wolf, Jr., unless otherwise noted

The John Quincy Wolf Folklore Collection
Lyon College, Batesville, Arkansas
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