On Kala,
Bela's heights,
where goats are bounding
And pine trees thinly shade the yellow sand
There is a glassy glade with palms surrounding
And gently sloping to the vine-glad strand
There one sees Corsica in clear weather
And distant provinces in azure rose
There one can smell the clover and the heather
There one can wonder lightly is a feather
Up in the mountain without any clothes
I rambled *** and happy there one morning
I'd come from Guttenberg across the seas
A big little roof my body was adorning
And in a box I carried bread and cheese
It was a lovely day,
above me singing I heard the little nightingale sing
Just like a bird set free from prison winging
I gambled gaily back to nature's springing
For I would lie upon earth's bosom fair
The goats and sheep were leaping all around me
Like little clouds they looked so wide and small
I'd held the nightingale's sweet songs around me
For I was part of all this pastoral
But in a while about my dinner thinking
Upon the grass I sat to taste my affair
A wine I opened and I soon was drinking
But when my head I turned I started
blinking I saw a naked maiden smiling there
In all my life I'd seen such beauty never
She came and stood quite near me on the green
And then before I got my roots together
Two other lovely maids came on the scene
They laughed and frolicked there without chemises And sang,
oh,
happy days are here again
Then up I sprang forgetting wine and cheeses
I tossed my fig leaf girdle to the breezes
The maidens ran while I pursued in vain
But in the evening I was in the city
And there again I met the lovely three And
they were glad in dresses white and pretty
As sweetly gracious as a man could see
But one so boldly took me by the hand then
And said,
I'm leaving on an early train We walked
beneath the palms along the strand then
We caught and drew some pictures in the sun then And sang,
oh,
happy days are here again
I come from San Francisco said the maiden
That's why I like to climb about the hills
I like to frolic without clothing laid
And I love nature without fuss or frills
Yes,
in America we're far more clever While
here in Europe you are more mundane
But you and I are much the same,
however Oh,
let us wander side by side forever
Oh,
darling, happy days are here again