Monday 3 March 2008

Counter-daffodils and disclaimers

After reading Liz's post honouring Wordsworth and his daffodils, I couldn't resist posting this version which I heard as an undergraduate years ago. No doubt I'm a terrible philistine, but I think I actually prefer it.

The disclaimer is that I'm not 100% sure who wrote it. I think it was a bloke I knew in one of the University clubs called Phil (the bloke, not the club). I can't now remember his surname. It was certainly from him that I heard it and I've never forgotten it, even though he only recited it once. If only my brain was so retentive of useful information!

I wandered, miserable as sin
Through smelly fields and muddy hills,
When all at once I trod right in
A pile of rotting daffodils.
I tried to wipe them off my shoe,
But they it seemed were truly stuck,
And so the fields I wandered through
All smelled of this revolting muck.
I soon espied an arty type,
Gazing at where some live ones stood
And spouting some appalling tripe
About how they made him feel good.
I remonstrated forcibly.
I thumped his head and poked his eye
Demanding he explain to me
Just why these things got him so high.
Said he, "Why Sir, a poet I
Employed in cloudlike wanderings,
When all at once I did espy
This clump of jolly yellow things!".
For giving such an awful quote
I cracked his head against a bough
And shoved the flowers down his throat.
Oh bard, what are your words worth now?

Sorry Liz!

1 comment:

Liz said...

No soul, that's your problem!