(reference: http://www.kaboodle.com/frank/cosmic-relief.html )

The Gettysburg Address

 Richard "Lord" Buckley, 1906-1960

Milords and Miladies of the world of people
most restfully and most humbly and with the deepest reverence 
for the great and precious American Saint Abraham Lincoln.

I shall translate in the modern semantic of the hip,
this new zig-zag semantic, his beloved Gettysburg Address.

Lincoln himself, a great lover of humor and beauty,
would understand and condone, I'm certain, this prelude to the address.

Now let me hip you cats and kitties
just how the scene went down.

Dig.

Every cat that swings with the rhythm of love of life
has some certain cat that he digs more than he does the next cat.

Now, you see that cat over there by the tree? 
Well he's a G.O.T. Washington cat.
He digs duckin the flow and stoppin' the woe.

But the cat next to him, he's a Benny Franklin cat. 
He digs watchin' his cash and coolin' his stash. 

And the cat right next to him with the feather in his hat,
he's an Eisenhower kiddie. 
He digs "let's not play the fool and lose the cool." 

But dat pretty chick right next to him,
wid da violet eyes and da crazy look, she's a Sinatra chick. 
She digs sweet rhythm swings the world.

But me.  I'm a Lincoln Cat. 

I dig old sweet long lanky non-stop Abe. 
"Lanky Linc" dey call da cat back in dem days. 
Well Lanky Linc went to a speechafyin' one time
and had a little MISunderstandin'. 
Dere was an LP type talkin' cat named Eddy Everet. 
And dis here cat got up on de podium
and wailed away and beat on his chops for so long
and so loud
that he shaved the place twenty-seven times,
rearranged it nine,
and adjust it twice,
and da cat is still up dere beatin' on his chops,
and Lanky Linc is sittin down in da bleachers goofin' with his scratch pad,
tryin' to get somethin down.

And he's gettin' somethin' down.

But, what he's gettin' down ain't movin' him.

But when dey called old Lanky Linc up to de podium
and he dug all dem cats and kiddies swingin' on the green sward,
great love look come on his Saint face,
and he put dis issue down to 'em, he say:


Four big hits and seven licks ago,
our before-daddies swung forth upon this sweet groovey land
a jumpin' wailin' stompin' swingin' new nation,
hip to the cool sweet groove of liberty
and solid sent upon the Ace lick dat all cats and kiddies,
red, white, or blue,
is created level in front. 

We are now hung with a king size main-day Civil Drag,
soundin' whether this nation or any up there nation,
so hip and so solid sent can stay with it all the way .

We have stomped out here to the hassle site
of some of the worst jazz blown in the entire issue.

Gettys-mother-burg.

We are here to turn on a small soil stash
of the before-mentioned hassle site
as a final sweet sod pad for those who laid it down
and left it there
so that this jumpin' happy beat might blow forever-more. 

And we all dig that this is the straightest lick. 

But diggin' it harder from afar we cannot mellow,
we cannot put down the stamp of the lord on this sweet sod
because the strong non-stop studs,
both diggin' it and dug under it,
who hassled here
have mellowed it with such a wild mad beat
that we can hear it, but we can't touch it.

Now the world cats will short dig nor long stash in their wigs
what we are beatin' our chops around here,
but it never can successively shade what they vanced here. 

It is for us the swingin'
to pick up the dues of these fine studs
who cut out from here
and fly it through to endsville. 
It is hipper for us to be signifyin'
to the glorious gig
that we can't miss with all these bulgin' eyes,
that from all these A-stamp studs we double our love kick, too,
that righeous line for which these hard cats
sounded the last nth bone of the beat of the bell. 

That we here want it stuck up straight
for all to dig that these departed studs
shall not have split in vain,
and that this nation
under the great swingin' Lord
shall swing up a whopper of endless Mardi Gras,
and that the big law by you straights,
from you cats,
and for you kiddies
shall not be scratched
from the big race. 

And there's why I'm a Lincoln Cat.




From Lord Buckley Live, Shambhala Lion Editions, 1991

Transcribed by Earl Rivers