Linux Songs Poems

To code the impossible code,            This is my quest --
To bring up a virgin machine,           To debug that code,
To pop out of endless recursion,        No matter how hopeless,
To grok what appears on the screen,     No matter the load,
                                        To write those routines
To right the unrightable bug,           Without question or pause,
To endlessly twiddle and thrash,        To be willing to hack FORTRAN IV
To mount the unmountable magtape,       For a heavenly cause.
To stop the unstoppable crash!          And I know if I'll only be true
                                        To this glorious quest,
And the queue will be better for this,  That my code will run CUSPy and calm,
That one man, scorned and               When it's put to the test.
        destined to lose,
Still strove with his last allocation
To scrap the unscrappable kludge!
                -- To "The Impossible Dream", from Man of La Mancha

To err is human,
To purr feline.
                -- Robert Byrne

To err is human, to purr feline.
To err is human, two curs canine.
To err is human, to moo bovine.

To everything there is a season, a time for every pupose under heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die;
A time to plant, and a time to pluck what is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
A time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
A time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones;
A time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to gain, and a time to lose;
A time to keep, and a time to throw away;
A time to tear, and a time to sew;
A time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate;
A time of war, and a time of peace.
                Ecclesiastes 3:1-9

To stand and be still,
At the Birkenhead drill,
Is a damned tough bullet to chew.
                -- Rudyard Kipling

To whom the mornings are like nights,
What must the midnights be!
                -- Emily Dickinson (on hacking?)

To write a sonnet you must ruthlessly
strip down your words to naked, willing flesh.
Then bind them to a metaphor or three,
and take by force a satisfying mesh.
Arrange them to your will, each foot in place.
You are the master here, and they the slaves.
Now whip them to maintain a constant pace
and rhythm as they stand in even staves.
A word that strikes no pleasure?  Cast it out!
What use are words that drive not to the heart?
A lazy phrase? Discard it, shrug off doubt,
and choose more docile words to take its part.
A well-trained sonnet lives to entertain,
by making love directly to the brain.

Tobacco is a filthy weed,
That from the devil does proceed;
It drains your purse, it burns your clothes,
And makes a chimney of your nose.
                -- B. Waterhouse

Too cool to calypso,
Too tough to tango,
Too weird to watusi
                -- The Only Ones

Troll sat alone on his seat of stone,
And munched and mumbled a bare old bone;
For many a year he had gnawed it near,
For meat was hard to come by.
        Done by!  Gum by!
In a cave in the hills he dwelt alone,
And meat was hard to come by.

Up came Tom with his big boots on.
Said he to Troll: "Pray, what is youn?
For it looks like the shin o' my nuncle Tim,
As should be a-lyin in graveyard.
        Caveyard!  Paveyard!
This many a year has Tim been gone,
And I thought he were lyin' in graveyard."

"My lad," said Troll, "this bone I stole.
But what be bones that lie in a hole?
Thy nuncle was dead as a lump o' lead,
Afore I found his shinbone.
        Tinbone!  Thinbone!
He can spare a share for a poor old troll
For he don't need his shinbone."

Said Tom: "I don't see why the likes o' thee
Without axin' leave should go makin' free
With the shank or the shin o' my father's kin;
So hand the old bone over!
        Rover!  Trover!
Though dead he be, it belongs to he;
So hand the old bnone over!"
                -- J. R. R. Tolkien