I have some follow up to the Barnes and Noble thread...but it being
late Friday afternoon, I thought we should have a little culture in
our agriculture instead.
Here's a sustainable ag poem by Don Marquis from the /archy and
Mehitabel/ series. As some of you may know, Marquis wrote a column
for the /New York Sun/ in the '20s, and in it he introduced archy, a
literary cockroach who'd come in in the night and stomp on the keys
on his typewriter to leave messages for Marquis. archy could only
type lower case and no punctuation because he couldn't shift. He was
a free verse poet, reincarnated as a cockroach, and this was how he
poured out his soul. He had a friend, a raggedy alley cat named
Mehitabel, an artist/dancer who was on her ninth life and was once
Cleopatra. The illustrations for the book editions of these poems
were done by George Herriman, the creator of Krazy Kat (my favorite
cartoon ever), and something is lost without that...but anyway,
here's to spiders. My apartment is overrun with them.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
pity the poor spiders
i have just been reading
an advertisement of a certain
roach exterminator
the human race little knows
all the sadness it
causes in the insect world
i remember some weeks ago
meeting a middle aged spider
she was weeping
what is the trouble i asked
her it is these cursed
fly swatters she replied
they kill off all the flies
and my family and i are starving
to death it struck me as
so pathetic that i made
a little song about it
as follows to wit
twas an elderly mother spider
grown gaunt and fierce and gray
with her little ones crouched beside her
who wept as she sang this lay
curses on these here swatters
what kills off all the flies
for me and my little daughters
unless we eats we dies
swattin and swattin and swattin
tis little else you hear
and we ll soon be dead and forgotten
with the cost of living so dear
my husband he up and left me
lured off by a centipede
and he says as he bereft me
tis wrong but i ll get a feed
and me a working and working
scouring the streets for food
faithful and never shirking
doing the best i could
curses on these here swatters
what kills off all the flies
me and my poor little daughters
unless we eats we dies
only a withered spider
feeble and worn and old
and this is what
you do when you swat
you swatters cruel and cold
i will admit that some
of the insects do not lead
noble lives but is every
man s hand to be against them
yours for less justice
and more charity
archy
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
If you'd like to see the Web version of the poem where archy
interviews the pharoah mummy in the museum who can think only of
beer (fermented small grain beverages, clearly agricultural):
http://www.sfo.com/~batt/archy/poem6.html
peace
michele
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
Michele Gale-Sinex, communications manager
Center for Integrated Ag Systems
UW-Madison College of Ag and Life Sciences
Voice: (608) 262-8018 FAX: (608) 265-3020
http://www.wisc.edu/cias/
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
If you knew what life was worth, you
would look for yours on earth. --Bob Marley
To Unsubscribe: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with "unsubscribe sanet-mg".
To Subscribe to Digest: Email majordomo@ces.ncsu.edu with the command
"subscribe sanet-mg-digest".