Father William and poetry

"You are old, father William," the young man said,
"And your hair has become very white;
And yet you incessantly stand on your head --
Do you think, at your age, it is right?

"In my youth," father William replied to his son,
"I feared it might injure the brain;
But, now that I'm perfectly sure I have none,
Why, I do it again and again."

"You are old," said the youth, "as I mentioned before,
And you have grown most uncommonly fat;
Yet you turned a back-somersault in at the door --
Pray what is the reason for that?"

"In my youth," said the sage, as he shook his grey locks,
"I kept all my limbs very supple
By the use of this ointment -- one shilling a box --
Allow me to sell you a couple?"

"You are old," said the youth, "and your jaws are too weak
For anything tougher than suet;
Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak --
Pray, how did you manage to do it?"

"In my youth," said his fater, "I took to the law,
And argued each case with my wife;
And the muscular strength, which it gave to my jaw,
Has lasted the rest of my life."

"You are old," said the youth, "one would hardly suppose
That your eye was as steady as ever;
Yet you balanced an eel on the end of your nose --
What made you so awfully clever?"

"I have answered three questions, and that is enough,"
Said his father. "Don't give yourself airs!
Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?
Be off, or I'll kick you down stairs.
-- Lewis Carroll

isn't it just delightful? this is a poem i came across in my first year of college. in school, except for a few gems, i found poems highly dull and boring. so when i entered college, i wasn't looking forward to poetry class with any marked enthusiasm.
the first surprise was my teacher, who had this great vocabulary and an amazing sense of humour. he made me feel at home at once and introduced me to the wild and wonderful world of peotry. this was a one of the first poems i studied in his class. it delighted me so much that i memorised the whole thing and nearly drove my frinds crazy, reciting it again and again!
this poem and my teacher were a major reason why i went on to study english literature in my undergraduate class. father william taught me that poetry could be as interesting as prose and sometimes more so. my teacher taught me to look beyond the lines, to appreciate their innate and sometimes unconcious humour, and for that i am grateful.

Cogito ergo sum

Familiar with Asterix? Then the above phrase must have sent you back to your childhood. It brought back fond memories for me. I spent so many years trying to figure out what it meant and I finally found the place of knowledge :D
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A218882
Their phrases are pretty handy and loads of fun. It's unbelievable how extremely serious a phrase like "I tought I taw a puddy tat" can sound. So dig in and enjoy!!

But what is so sad is that these days hardly anybody even recognises Asterix or Obelix. If I ask around among my friends, the name Asterix will be recieved with a blank stare. I feel so sorry for all those people out there who have never experienced the joy of Asterix's latest escapade or laughed at Cacofonix's latest tune. Tintin fares a little better coz of the recent cartoon series. But how can anyone appreciate Captain Haddock's rich repertoire of curses after they've been translated into Hindi? The original words have to be heard to be fully appreciated. One of my personal faves - "Billions of bilious blue blistering barnacles in ten thousand thundering typhoons!" How can you not love something like that???
My father has almost the whole series of Asterix and Tintin comics. When I was a kid, I would lie around for hours and hours upon end, leafing thru the books one by one. Back then, I couldn't understand much more than the basic story, but that was hilarious enough for me. Now, when I open one of those books, I appreciate deeper layers of meaning, the slight nuances here and there. The names in the Asterix comics make a lot more sense now. Who could forget the incredible chief Vitalstatistix, the potions of the druid Getafix, the quarrels between Fulliautomatix the blacksmith and Unhygenix the fishmonger? And why would anybody want to forget anything so wonderful! My parents, my brother and me, we are all fans of Asterix and Tintin. We've read the comics innumerable times and conversations at mealtimes are so full of allusions that an outsider would feel absolutely lost.
The comics that come out today are nice no doubt, but they aren't a patch compared to the vagaries of Asterix and his horde of Gauls or to Tintin and Captain Haddock's merry curses!