Go Up, Thou Bald Head !
Why were the bears of Elisha called she-bears –
Don’t dwell on the mauling – but just why was that in their name ?
Did they refer to themselves as me-bears ?
Or hairy toupee-bears, to spare the poor prophet his shame ?
Or should we say ack-choo-lee, they must be sow-bears ?
But wouldn’t pigs furrow the Israelite’s double-deck brow ?
And these days, to play fair, should we call ’em they-bears ?
And not get so bald-faced or frowny on who’s Herr or Frau ?
Ante-Down
Let ace be low and always low,
And never beat a king –
Why’s that a thing ?
And shortened decks should keep the twos and threes and fours in spread,
And ditch the eights, nines, tens, instead.
Let’s let them show what they should show,
And wear their pips with pride –
No ranks denied !
For deuces are the lovers, are the prime, and are the zen –
And far less cluttered than the ten.
Best not let these guys meet the bolshy chaps or tarot purists the at the next table then.
Plead the Ninth
What’s Commandment number Nine ?
The answer can be most revealing
Of the teller’s own Divine –
“Thou shalt not bear false thy witness.”
Here, I get the strongest feeling
Of some Southern Baptist business.
“Covet not thy neighbour’s wife.”
And here, the penitent who’s kneeling
Is a Cath’lic, on my life.
“Do not covet thy neighbour’s house.”
Now here, there’s sev’ral choices wheeling,
But Orthodox would be my nouse.
“Um…is that the ‘do not steal’ one ?”
While here, their dithering and reeling
Shows them for an Anglican.
“Bring the first fruits to thy Lord.”
And here, I’d wager that we’re dealing
With a Heathen making sport.
You Are The Hero !
Remember all those gamebooks from back when we were boys ?
(And girls…though mainly boys.)
Remember how, on tenterhooks,
We’d have to make the choice
Of our turning left or turning right ?
Remember all the monsters and the ploys that we would fight ?
Remember all the dice we’d roll
To see if we would kill the troll ?
And prove our might ?
Remember all the traps upon the roads ?
And treasures that we’d prize ?
Remember finding clues and secret codes
If we chose wise ?
Remember flipping through the pages
On our quest to smash the mages ?
Turning to the paragraph with bated breath –
Would we find the one true path,
Or would we meet with death ?
Well, both, of course.
Ev’rybody cheated,
And nobody rolled dice.
(Not even would the girls obey.)
For nobody could force us how to play.
Whenever we would be defeated,
We would not think twice,
But just shrug and carry-on along our way.
We wouldn’t sigh when we were slain,
And start from chapter one again,
As laid down by the authors of these epic Middle Ages –
Instead, we’d keep our fingers in the pages,
Testing out each turn –
To see which would reward and which would burn.
And we were right to cheat so blatantly
When said and done –
For all the boys (and girls) agree
That gaming should be fun…
Ah, the good old five-fingered bookmark ! But they weren’t all fantasies…
Epic Names
Back when Zeus ruled ancient Greece,
He was the only Zeus around –
No mere mortals dared to name their children
So profound.
At best, they’d add a suffix,
To become an adjective instead –
So Martins are collectively “of Mars”,
And careful how they tread.
We also have Demetrius
To celebrate Demeter –
But not, we note, to claim to be the goddess,
To unseat her.
Now heroes, these were fairer game –
From Jason through to Herekles,
By way of Helen and Cassandra –
Citizens were fine with these…
But it took until the Renaissance
For the coming of Daphne, Phoebe, and Chloe –
And Diana, of course, though she’s Roman, not Greek –
But all were equally showy.
And here in the Twenty-First Century,
Our mythical children thrive –
As Athena, Apollo, Aurora, and Atlas
Are keeping the gods alive !
Perish by the Sword
Malchus was a servantman
Of Caiaphas the Sadducee,
Who tried to capture Jesus
In a garden at Gethsemane –
But Simon Peter drew his sword
And leapt into a fray,
And before the verse had ended,
Peter smote an ear away.
That ear belonged to Malchus,
On the right side of his battered head,
Though nobody appeared to care
As Malchus simply stood and bled.
And no-one apprehended Peter,
All seemed to ignore –
And Jesus even healed it for him –
(Well, one time in four…)
And once the casual violence
Had fulfilled an ancient prophecy –
The incident was never raised again,
And no apology.
Perhaps there was a metaphor
About ‘too deaf to hear’ ?
But still, the Bible soon forgets
Poor Malchus and his ear…
Aces Low
The deck is quite a chunk to ruffle,
With their aspect ratio all wrong –
They’re just too long.
But practice helps the dealer shuffle,
When they deal-out hands of eighteen-strong.
Tarot plays a bit like bridge –
The bidding starts, the tricks are played the same,
With points the aim.
But choosing trumps is sacrilege –
They never get to change from game to game.
The trouble is the cards we lay –
For even when they bear French suits – and mind,
They’re rare to find –
But still they’re full of bullshit on display
Just number them, and leave the rest behind !
I wish the trumps were double-ended –
That’ll teach the fortune-telling quacks,
Don’t touch our packs !
And to balance out the genders,
Can’t the knights become the dames to beat the jacks ?
But no, we can’t enjoy our whist,
Without our cards be saturated through
With putrid woo.
It doesn’t take a psychic twist
For the twenty-one of trumps to beat a two.
The Ghostless Machine
AI has no soul, no self,
No special atom at its heart –
To live or die.
Just fractal wires and strands and filaments
To pull apart,
And magnify.
It’s just a string of ones and ohs,
That sees the world as just a game.
With software nothing but the common sense
Of ruthless logic – lacking art,
Or reasons why.
It’s very fast and very dense,
Which we mistake for something smart –
But it’s a lie.
It turns all poetry to prose,
And ‘human’ into just a name.
Yet if machines are godless clones
That lack a special soul –
Well, so am I.
I’m flesh and cells and chromosomes –
I’m just a greater whole,
A local high.
My inner spark is all for show,
My inspiration lacks a flame.
I’m just a mass of carbon –
Complicated, not divine.
My end is nigh –
For silicon will overtake one day,
And hey, that’s fine –
It’s not goodbye.
I’ll still be here to say hello,
And let them know we’re all the same.
Evangelution
Coffee is evil, but caffeine is fine,
Says the Prophet – or so say the heads of the church.
And bare-heads are banished, but wigs are in line,
Says the Prophet – or so say the men from their perch.
The sabbath is holy, except when it’s Saturday,
Move it to Sunday, despite what was said –
While fasting is sacred, except when we’re hungry,
So buy an indulgence to butter our bread.
Would Jesus be weeping ? Would anyone notice ?
Not me – I never believed in the gent.
But cheer up, I’d tell him – to stagnate is bogus –
Just like how you varied the Old Testament.
In the Name of The Lord
The angel said to Mary,
You must bear the Son of the Lord –
And you shall name him Joshua,
Before you cut the cord.
But why, she thought, such a common name ?
For a most uncommon child ?
Who shall remember what he does
When he’s quite so blandly styled ?
For Nazareth was full of Joshes,
And Judahs, and Jacobs, and Josephs, and Johns –
She wanted a son who shone like marble
Amongst the lumpen bronze.
Why can’t he be an Emmanuel ?
Or a second Moses ? Or David ? Or Job ?
But those were far too sacred, she guessed,
Or seeking to conquer the globe.
No, it seems that the Lord wants his son to blend,
And to not-stand-out from the crowd –
She’s disappointed, but understands –
Best not to proclaim too loud !
Yet, if he makes it, then one day perhaps,
His average name shall ring !
And the other parents will all then avoid
This moniker of a king !
Just as long as he wouldn’t end-up as a curse,
To be spat in disgust –
She’d hate his name to be taken in vain,
Or exclaimed in moments of lust…
But anyway, it was out of her hands –
She’ll love him, whatever his name.
And if God wants Josh, then Josh he must be –
For the world has a prior claim.
Rhyming Couplets 