;Stay and I’ll Sing! is yet another cumulative song celebrating the twelve-ness of the midwinter season. We learned it from the remarkable collection of songs edited by Ruth Crawford Seeger as American Folksongs for Christmas, where it is called “The Twelve Apostles.” The Seeger family led by Peggy recorded it on the LP/CD set of these songs.

Stay and I’ll Sing! What’ll you sing?
I’ll sing one. What is one?”
One’s a One and all alone and that shall never be, oh

Two bear a lily-white bud and they were clad in green, oh
Three, three thrivers
Four for the Gospel writers
Five come on my boys and
Six for the six pot waters
Seven be all the stars and
Eight for the gabbling rangers
Nine for the nine bright shiners
Ten for the Ten Commandments
Eleven for the eleven archangels
Twelve for the Twelve Apostles

One’s a One and all alone and that is all we’ll sing, oh

© Golden Hind Music