A Paupers Parable

Is this how life begins?

Gordon O'Gord and Michael De Ville

Lived next door to an old landfill,

Gordon was nine and a half, they say,

And Michael nine on the following day.

 

The boys were poor, they played about,

Their parents left them to holler and shout,

They played in the rubbish at Eden's Spill

And gathered their toys from the old landfill.

 

Gordon's mother was Mary O'Gord,

A lush in every sense of the word,

While Michael's mother, wherever she be,

Has gone to hell in a handbag, she!

 

One day, while foraging near and far

The boys uncovered an old bell jar,

A great big stopper was still in place,

The surface shone, you could see your face!

 

'Now this is gear!' said Gordon: 'Hah!

'We'll keep our treasures in this old jar,

Let's hide it well, so no-one can steal

The things we take from the old landfill.'

 

They took the jar, and carried it home,

To stand on a shelf where the bright sun shone,

Then filled it slowly with care, each mite

Like a piece of ore from a meteorite.

 

A lump of chalk, a carbon rod,

They each agreed with a wink, a nod,

Some Peacock ore from a copper mine

And sulphur pills were a special find.

 

An old watch face with luminous hands,

Some iron ore with rusty strands,

A fertilizer they found undone

That said: 'For replenishing nitrogen.'

 

It rained one day, poured down the sill

Into the jar that was partly filled,

The water level with rocks and ore

Trickled like streams from a waterfall;

 

Ran right over the toothpaste squeeze,

Dissolved the hint of an Alpine breeze,

The water took it on over the sill

Along with the essence of chlorophyll.

 

When Gordon challenged Michael De Ville,

'You dope, you left with the jar unsealed,

I told you to put the stopper back!'

Then Michael sulked at his mate's attack.

 

The boys fell out, as boys they will

O'Gord was bigger than Michael De Ville,

So Michael schemed and he plotted then

To get the best of his older friend.

 

He waited until the time was right

Then under cover of stars and night

He took some ammonium cleaner there

And poured it into the old bell jar.

 

It fizzed and hissed, gave off a cloud

Of greenish gas like a misty shroud,

And soon it filled up the old bell jar -

You couldn't see what was what in there.

 

When Gordon came, he said: 'Oh, great!

Well, that's the end of our friendship, mate!'

So Michael then, he cursed and he swore

To cut the lunch of Gordon O'Gord.

 

The days went by, and the passing weeks,

The bell jar cooked its ingredients,

The mist, it gradually cleared away,

The sun shone steadily, day by day;

 

Heated the jar, melted the ore,

Formed bedrock and an atmosphere,

Radiation from luminous hands

Sparked a miracle, carbon strands;

 

Amino acids were leached, all right

From the lump of ore from the meteorite,

And when young Gordon had turned thirteen

He chanced to look at the jar again.

 

But there in the beams of broad sunlight

Were things that moved, and things in flight,

A tiny people, as busy as bees,

Were building factories under the trees.

 

Cars were driving on tiny roads,

And sports, with all of the football codes,

Beaches, all with their golden sand

And cinemas featuring 'Superman!'

 

The sea was blue with an azure sky

And boats were bobbing there, by and by,

A scene like this was a pauper's dream

To young O'Gord, who was just thirteen.

 

And there in an open field, alone,

A building stood, it was made of stone,

A lofty spire with a Norman Steeple,

Where others prayed for the good of the people.

 

Gordon's jaw, it dropped to the floor

He muttered... 'Oh!' He shouted 'Gawd!'

The bell jar shook at the mighty roar,

And the people cringed... Muttered: 'O'Gord!'

 

Now every now and then De Ville

Comes round to work his evil will,

He drops great rocks from ancient heights,

The people think that they're meteorites.

 

He scrawls on tablets hasty runes

After he's eaten his morning prunes,

And drops them onto their mountainsides

'The Ten Commandments', then laughs ('til he cries!)

 

He shakes the jar to cause Tsunami's,

Provokes the people to raise great armies,

Bellows with glee through the stopper hole:

'The DeVille will get you before you grow old!'

 

Their cry goes up, 'Save us, O'Gord,

From the DeVil's work and his mighty sword!'

But Gordon has gone, he's headed for Fipps

Where he goes to purchase his fish and chips!

 

David Lewis Paget

Author's Note

(Readers seem bemused by the Fish and Chips ending of this - the point is that perhaps God didn't exactly set out to create man, but that we were a bi-product of his delving about with chemicals in 'the bell jar'. In the end he loses interest and goes off to pursue other things, leaving us to the tender mercies of the 'De-vil').

Reviews

[Trée]

David, I read and then I sit in wonder and amazement at your talent with this medium. Your poems sing, and the bard has a sense of humor as a spring, waiting and waiting, the reader knows, to unleash its power wound stanza by stanza with your skill. Your gift shines bright. I hope these works are published. They are too good not to find a wider audience.

[C.T. Bailey]

In your classic narrative form lies the epic struggle of good and evil, God and satan, faith and foreshadow. Although you (as you frequently do) have written this tale with a humorous overtone, you fully captured the tensions of society, just as you planned to do. Another brilliant piece. This one give cause for the practioner of faith and the faithless to think. Well done David....
Todd

[Silent Kim aka mizmetap..]

You have such an imagination, the picture was clear, you seduce your reader so easily into your world. I loved the vision of the world inside a jar. to think if we lived in a jar and all that we experience was a childs curiosity and playing. fantatic work, I loved this write.

[Poeticpiers]

Brilliant absolutely brilliant my friend As usual perfectly delivered I dont know whether to laugh or crySuch a perfectly allegorical tale ivor