We think ourselves the kings and queens of this our planet Earth;
the right to use it as we wish bestowed on us at birth.
But there are limits to abuses nature will allow;
the consequences of our acts begin to haunt us now.
This promised land, like a mirage, may well soon disappear,
and vanish in a heat-haze as our folly becomes clear.
Let's mourn our milk and honey as it trickles down the drain;
we cannot solve a three-pipe problem with a one-pipe brain.
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Author Notes
Today's word: three-pipe (adj.) extremely complex, requiring much thought.
My much-treasured Christmas present for 2017 is a book by Paul Anthony Jones: "The cabinet of linguistic curiosities". Each page contains a descriptive story about some obscure or archaic word. It occurred to me it would be a fun exercise to try and write, each day, a poem featuring the "word of the day" from the book.
This was inspired by two very different stories. The first is Conan Doyle's The Red-Headed League, in which Sherlock calls a particularly difficult piece of deduction a "three-pipe problem", referring to the time needed to solve it -- the time to consume three of bowls of tobacco. The second is the description of the promised land in the Biblical book of Deuteronomy as "a land flowing with milk and honey" -- a phrase indicating great beauty and abundance.
Thanks for reading.
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