~ Memories from a Coal Miner's Daughter ~

Have you ever roamed
Those West Virginia Hills?
Have you ever heard the songs
of the whip-o-wills?

Have you ever felt the rumbling
beneath your feet?
As the coal miners were digging
from way down deep?

Life was hard in those old towns
No easy task was ever found
None the less, it must be done
Digging that coal 'til the set of sun

The shift was night to day or day to night
Those dirty faces, a pitiful sight
But the spirit living in each soul
Was dedicated, to digging that coal

They will dig all it out
of those big steep hills
The coal under the mountains,
beneath the rocks and reels

The Grand old Rivers
keep rolling on and on
Filled with coal barges
From dusk to dawn

There's fishing for food.
and water for pleasure.
White Water rafting
and fun without measure

There's nothing as pretty
as those mountains down there
With the fragrance of honeysuckle
filling the Spring air

Spring or Summer
what can I say,
To describe all the colors
in this vast array?

Trees wrapped in God's beauty
Flowers filled with His love
Growing in the valleys
and on the mountains above

For all these years
God has blessed this State
Blessed her people
and made them great

I'm proud to have come
from out of those hills
and to have heard the songs
of the Whip-o-wills

To belong to the coal miners
hard working crew
Because I'm a daughter
of a coal miner too

Betty Hill
© 2004 used with permission
ponymae1@hotmail.com
 

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