rewrites

[dedalus]

The road was a ribbon of moonlight across the purple moor

when the highwayman came riding, riding up to my front door.

Sirrah, raged he, in tones of dudgeon and high incense:

no more delay, I pray, please pay for your TV license!

 

***

 

Come pensive nun, devout and pure,

sober, steadfast and demure.

Let's go out and have some fun:

we'll dance the fandango and the tango,

and I'll have you home by half past one.

 

***

 

There is sweet music here which softer lies

thn tired eyelids upon tired eyes;

when it gets too much I make it stop

and switch my iPod to hip hop.

 

***

 

The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold

and his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;

with ulullating cries they surrounded my car,

and sold me five rugs and a bug in a jar.

 

***

 

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought

I summon up remembrance of things past,

I think of fine ladies I have caught

and hope the latest won't be last.

 

***

 

I will arise now and go to Inisfree,

and a cabin I will build there of clay and wattles made;

nine whiskey stills shall I have there, all made just for me,

smoke dope in a purple glow, then doze off in the shade.

 

***

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure-dome decree:

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

Through caverns measureless to man

Down to a sunless sea.

And I remember how he said to me,

you can't take pleasure with you,

you must take your pleasures now,

with girls brought in from Vegas

and gamblers from Macau.

 

***

 

No man is an island entire of itself; every man

is a piece of the continent, a part of the main;

This much is surely plain.

Half-serious, half glitter and tinsella,

A man is in fact a peninsula.

 

-------------------------------------------------

OK ... the ball is rolling. Give it a go!

[Frank E Gibbard]

First to take the plunge, to your suggestion Bren. What a fun idea, I hope others follow.

 

My wee effort, just for starters can't compare to yours - I shan't. By the way I enjoyed the Donne one particularly, the very funny ending though I must confess I'm sorry that I've never come across "tinsella" (my ignorance perhaps). Anyway ...

 

(untitled parody of a famed song by the Scottish bard if it counts)

 

O my lover with your red red nose,

Sweet promontory, oh so sublime,

Thy blush was so very truly earned

Through days of hard drinking time.