I think yon Stigweard owes me much,
Some single-malt, a dozen roses,
By starting up this second thread,
And treading on my toeses.

It's not that I'm of grumpy mind,
Nor greatly stuffy-shirted,
But by the name he gave his thread,
My feelings, sir, were hurted!

The Poetry? All by itself?
Beyond all peer or brother?
I think he might have looked to see
There already was another!!

This daft audacity of his
Claiming the field entire,
Doth irritate my lower bowel,
And stirs my deepest ire!

Go to, go to! How dost thou dast?
The brass! The nerve! The gumption!!
A lesser man would be ashamed
Of such nominal presumption.

But never mind your stammering vows,
Your explanations flimsy;
For we are on the Mudcat now,
Where nothing rules but whimsy.

Go then ahead, and cull thy rhymes,
The doggerel-tainted verses.
No matter what trash my thread gets,
I'll know where something worse is!

Pontiff O'Keats Freely
On The Tide of Minor Phlegm
from "Couplets We May Do Without",
Ebenezer, Geezer, and Wheezer, pubs.
Edinburgh,1978