Digital Tradition Mirror

The Twelve Days of Marxmas

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Pennywhistle notation and Dulcimer tab for this song is also available

The Twelve Days of Marxmas
(Roy Berkeley)

On the first day of Marxmas, my comrade gave to me:
A picture of Leon Trotsky.
Two Das Kapitals
Three bayonets
Fourth International
The Five Year Plan
Six splinter groups
seven strikers swinging
Eight Bulganins bulging
Nine men in the Kremlin
Ten days a-shaking
Eleven Lenins leaping
Twelve Hunky fascists

note: Some of the references are arcane and make sense primarily
to students of communist history and the Stalin-Trotsky split. For
example, the Fourth International was the international organization
of Trotsky's followers (the Third International aka the Comintern
was Stalin's). The reference to nine men in the Kremlin refers to the
Politburo. Ten Days that Shook the World. Eleven Lenin's leaping is a
delicious alliteration of which I am (still) quite proud forty years on.
And twelve Hunky fascists refers to the Stalinist Calumny that the
Hungarians who revolted against Soviet tyranny in 1956 were all fascists---
of course, they were no more fascist than the Hungarians who finally
freed themselves from Soviet tyranny 1989-1991. RGB


Note from RG:
Folks process things. The following was found in a book by Carl Sandburg's
daughter.

On the first day of Marxmas, my comrades gave to me

A picture of Leon Trotsky
Two Das Kapitals
Three bayonets
Four bowls borscht
Five year plan
Six workers starving (or Bulganins bulging)
Seven Lenins leaping
Eight Stalins staring
Nine bloody purges
Ten Sputniks spinning
Eleven vats of vodka
Twelve counts of treason

From Sweet Music, Sandburg

RG

Thanks to Mudcat for the Digital Tradition!