"Mountain Greenery" is a popular song composed by Richard Rodgers, with lyrics by Lorenz Hart for the musical The Garrick Gaieties (1926). It was first performed on stage by Sterling Holloway. Mel Tormé had a top-five hit in the UK with his cover version in 1956.
Lyrics
The lyrics display Hart's characteristic use of enjambement and witty and unexpected internal rhymes e.g. 'lover let' and 'coverlet' and 'keener re...' rhymed with 'beanery':
{Verse 1}
On the first of May
It is moving Day
Spring is here, so
Blow your job,
Throw your job away
Now’s the time to trust
To your wanderlust
In the city’s dust you wait
Must you wait?
Just you wait!
[Chorus 1]
In a mountain greenery
Where God paints the scenery
Just two crazy people together
While you love your lover, let
blue skies be your coverlet
If it rains we’ll laugh at the weather
And if you’re good
I’ll search for wood
So you can cook
While I stand look-
ing
Beans could get no keener re-
ception in a beanery
Bless our mountain greenery home.
{Interlude}
When the world was young, Old
father Adam with
Sin did grapple
So we’re entitled to
Just one apple
I mean
To make apple sauce.
Underneath the bough
We’ll learn a lesson from
Mr. Omar
Beneath the eyes of no pa and no ma.
Old lady Nature is boss.
Washing dishes
Catching fishes
In the running stream,
We’ll curse the smell of
Citronella,
Even when we dream,
Head upon the ground
Your downy pillow is just a boulder
I’ll have new dimples before I’m older
But life is peaches and cream.
[Chorus 2 partial]
And if you’re good
I’ll search for wood
So you can cook
While I stand look-
ing
Beans could get no keener re-
ception in a beanery
Bless our mountain greenery home.
{Verse 2}
Simple cooking means
More than French cuisines
I’ve a banquet planned, which is
Sandwiches
And beans
Coffee’s just as grand
With a little sand
Eat and you’ll grow fatter, boy,
S’matter boy?
Atta boy!
[Chorus 3]
In a mountain greenery
Where God paints the scenery
Just two crazy people together,
How we love sequestering
Where no pests are pestering
No Dear mama hold us in tether,
Mosquitoes here
Won’t bite you dear,
I’ll let them sting
Me on the fin-
ger.
We could find no cleaner re-
treat from life’s machinery
Than our mountain greenery home