Subject: Sweet Caroline
From: Christopher W. Thomas (creatician@poetic.com)
Host: 207-172-227-106.s43.as1.dnb.erols.com
Date: Fri Nov 27, 1998 at 1:21PM

Sweet Caroline ... today you are turning forty-one ...

It's hard to believe - it'd seemed you were still so young
But a few days ago, was the 35th anniversary of the day
You and John became fatherless when your dad paid ...

A heavy debt for all the mistakes of his recent past
When he was cut down in a hail of bullets so fast
And you were just five years old at the very time
Becoming six just under a week after the crime

And now you're older than your father was when he first ran
Just a year before you were born ... when Dad took his stand
But losing the party nomination that very first time around ...
Folks just weren't ready for him then ... he needed more ground

Which he'd acquired over the next four years' ride
As you came into the world, giving him such pride
And then, he ran again when you were just two ...
And was elected then - the youngest man ever to do

Sweet Caroline ... you must have been so proud ...
When it dawned on you, your Daddy had avowed
To end the havoc then wrought over civil rights
To raze Berlin's dividing wall, and all its plight

To put a man on the moon before the decade ended
And to bring peace to all of the big cities which tended
To show their care and devotion to the needs of all ...
No matter which buses they rode to work and to school

In fact ... avowing to end segregation in all of the states
And then to encourage it everywhere - defusing all the hate
... And now - all these years later ... we still pay him homage
For your Daddy, Sweet Caroline ... fulfilled all the promise ...

- Tristram

(c) Christopher W. Thomas
1:15pm Friday, Nov. 27th, 1998