The Barking Mad River
Posted: Thu Nov 15, 2012 9:29 pm
The Barking Mad River – in unhinged metre - well, insane anyway- oh, suit yourself.
Far down past the valley there’s a wide rolling plain
where the river called Barking has gone quite insane
as it drunkenly wanders and circles around
but is vexed by the nature of paths it has found.
It tries to go left, but in its path is a block,
a large black protuberance of volcanic rock,
so perforce it flows right as a right river would
and tries to go leftish just as soon as it could
But there in its way is yet another great stone
so keeps on its turning as it must do alone
and fills up a basin of cold hardy granite
and if it was minded would likely say, “dam it”.
So pumps in the water til it no longer flows
then right up to the bank the mad Barking stuff goes
and growling and frothing it escapes o’er the top
but is quickly and sadly then brought to a stop
as it meets its own self still slow flowing on down
which must cause the mad river to pause with a frown
til it finds a solution as mad rivers must
not based much in science but entirely in trust.
“I’m a drunken mad river now deep in my cup,
so one side will flow down while the other flows up!”
And so that’s how it ran for a half mile or so
til the side that flowed up found a new way to flow
and then Barking Mad rolled to the west and the sea
where it married a seagull.
©maltheoldfart 2012
Far down past the valley there’s a wide rolling plain
where the river called Barking has gone quite insane
as it drunkenly wanders and circles around
but is vexed by the nature of paths it has found.
It tries to go left, but in its path is a block,
a large black protuberance of volcanic rock,
so perforce it flows right as a right river would
and tries to go leftish just as soon as it could
But there in its way is yet another great stone
so keeps on its turning as it must do alone
and fills up a basin of cold hardy granite
and if it was minded would likely say, “dam it”.
So pumps in the water til it no longer flows
then right up to the bank the mad Barking stuff goes
and growling and frothing it escapes o’er the top
but is quickly and sadly then brought to a stop
as it meets its own self still slow flowing on down
which must cause the mad river to pause with a frown
til it finds a solution as mad rivers must
not based much in science but entirely in trust.
“I’m a drunken mad river now deep in my cup,
so one side will flow down while the other flows up!”
And so that’s how it ran for a half mile or so
til the side that flowed up found a new way to flow
and then Barking Mad rolled to the west and the sea
where it married a seagull.
©maltheoldfart 2012
