Bride's Farewell

Kindly teach thy bride in secret
In the long and dreary evenings
When you're sitting at the fireside
Teach one year in words of kindness
Teach with eyes of love a second
In the third year teach with firmness
If she should not heed thy teaching
Should not hear thy kindly counsel
After three long years of effort
Cut a reed upon the lowlands
Cut a nettle from the border
Teach thy wife with harder measures u-uh

In the fourth year if she heed not
Threaten her with sterner treatment
With the stalks of rougher edges
Do not touch her on the forehead
Nor upon the ears nor visage
If a ridge be on her forehead oh
Or a blue mark on her eyelids
Then her mother would perceive it
Her father would take notice
All the village-workmen see it
And the village-women ask her
'Has thou been in heat of battle'

Hit me baby one more time
Hit me baby one more time she says and I will kill you uh-u

Shame her thus to do her duty
Strike not yet, though disobeying
Should she disregard this warning
Gather all thy sticks in silence
Gather quietly the birch-wood
That the father may not fancy
And the mother not imagine
That thy calling came from anger
And thy noise from discontentment
Hide it underneath thy mantle
That the stranger may not see it
Show it to thy wife in secret

Hit me baby one more time
Hit me baby one more time
Hit me baby one more time she says
Hit me baby one more time she says and I will kill you uh-u