From Rude Rural Rhymes by Bob Adams, New York: The Macmillan Company; 1925; pp. 95-96.
HAIR TONIC
I hear that milk and garden greens
Have snappy things called vitamines
That give us health and strength and pep
And put the ginger in our step,
But what is this I also hear
From folks who ought to know
That vitamines will help to make
Our hair and whiskers grow.
I find my Jove-like dome of thought
Of shade not quite bereft.
I’ll use this happy hunch and keep
What herbage I have left.
The razor makes a daily trip
Along my chin and jowls and lip,
So by my wife it is not feared
That I will ever raise a beard
Or whiskers like a Bolshevik;
But O I want my hair to stick.
Upon my brain box flies would crawl
If I should sport no hair at all,
And those that lit upon my head
Would have to wear a non-skid tread.
They’d slip and slither on my scalp
[96]
Like mountain climbers on an Alp.
To ward them off my hair I’ll keep
Though I chew lettuce in my sleep.
To nourish bristles on my brow
I’ll buy myself a mooley cow.
If milk and vegetables clinch
The thatch upon our beans,
So help me Pete but I will eat
A lot of spinach greens.