recorded · 1881 · north noemic
the first hour is for the kettle. the second hour is for the dough. the third hour is the long one — and that is the one i will not know. so wake me at the first hour, and at the second, do not. and at the third, walk softly past me, as a kind person ought.
collected from a kitchen-woman near the river, who would not give her name and said the song belonged to her mother and to no one else. she sang it under her breath while shelling peas, and would not sing it twice.
the third hour is the three a.m. sleep, the hour the dough proves and the body lengthens. north noemic kitchens have kept the song without writing it for at least four generations.
the kettle's warning for the unhurried kitchen four a.m. ritual