Don't Slay That Potato



by Tom Paxton







How can you do it? It's heartless, it's cruel.

It's murder, cold-blooded, it's gross.

To slay a poor vegetable just for your stew

Or to serve with some cheese sauce on toast.

Have you no decency? Have you no shame?

Have you no conscience, you cad,

To rip that poor vegetable out of the earth

Away from its poor mom and dad?



CHORUS:



Oh, no, don't slay that potato!

Let us be merciful, please.

Don't boil it or fry it, don't even freeze-dry it.

Don't slice it or flake it.

For God's sake, don't bake it!

Don't shed the poor blood

Of this poor helpless spud.

That's the worst kind of thing you could do.

Oh, no, don't slay that potato

What never done nothing to you!





Why not try picking on something your size

Instead of some carrot or bean?

The peas are all trembling there in their pod

Just because you're so vicious and mean.

How would you like to be grabbed by your hair

And ruthlessly yanked from your bed

And have done to you God knows what horrible things,

To be eaten with full-fiber bread?



(CHORUS)



It's no bed of roses, this vegetable life.

You're basically stuck in the mud.

You don't get around much. You don't see the sights

When you're a carrot or celery or spud.

You're helpless when somebody's flea-bitten dog

Takes a notion to pause for relief.

Then somebody picks you and cleans you and eats you

And causes you nothing but grief.



(CHORUS)



There ought to be some way of saving our skins.

They ought to be passing a law.

Just show anybody a cute little lamb

And they'll all stand around and go "Aw!"

Well, potatoes are ugly. Potatoes are plain.

We're wrinkled and lumpy to boot.

But give me a break, kid. Do you mean to say

That you'll eat us because we're not cute?



(CHORUS