With a stiff upper lip and old school tie
still it's just not cricket
but the upper crust they say
are on a sticky wicket
to pay the estate or make ends meet
they have conducted tours
of stately homes safari parks
and the family jewels
we used to go to Scarborough Southend-on-Sea
Bognor Brighton Blackpool
have fish 'n' chips for tea
but now for fifty pee we natter
with a Duchess or the Duke
for half a quid a cuppa
with a true blue-blooded bloke
as they're all skint like me and you
there's not a lot a poor Lord can do
but bite the bullet and enjoy
hobnobbing with the hoi polloi
All aboard the bizarre Farage barge..
Unless of course you are from abroad..
.
Narcissist catalyst.. old school fraud..discord twist..
Can't resist.. staging the raging red mist..
Fist of Mob rule tryst does persist..
Depraved raves..insist..craved faves..
Won't save slaves & knaves..
Hellbent they are sent..
To graves under the waves…
Foolish votes for ghoulish gloats..
Seedier media leaders lying..
Defying the dying..
Folks crying..ghastly ghostly boats..
Crude jokes delude..lewd masterstrokes denude..
Corporate rascal castle debacle floats..
On dank murky murderous moats..
Scuffles.. muffles ruffles & kerfuffles
Pokes & provokes just for bank notes..
The ubiquity of inequity
This poem or tome..
Every face…race should be.
Free to roam..
In this place..
We all call home..
There was an eagerly keen schoolboy,
Who when used the Greek term ‘hoi polloi’,
His teacher, a pedant--
A kind of stinging ant,
Corrected it to ‘the hoi polloi’;
Sir, my apology,
Ain't it tautology?
No, use grammar, boys as would a toy!
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In Greek, hoi polloi means ‘the people’. Thus, hoi is the article ‘the’, and when we say ‘the hoi polloi’ which is the way the expression is used in English, there doubtless is tautology. But usage determines grammar, not the other way around. Further, when we say ‘eagerly keen’, there too is some tautology as well. Further, the word pedant comes from French and Italian, and perhaps from Greek ‘pais’, whose teacher is called pedagogue. Pedant earlier meant only a teacher, but later on acquired its today’s meaning: one who lays excessive stress upon trifling details of knowledge.
My fellow poets might have sometimes faced comments that border on being pedantic.
______________________________________________________
Ways of words |04.06.2020|
Topic: humour, school, boy, teacher, apology, tautology
There’s no need to be all hoity-toity when you’re in the hoi polloi,
My mother used to tell me when I was just a little boy.
Live your life as best as you can and don’t build it up too high,
Because anyway you look at it you’re an ordinary guy.
Always deal with simple things and in them you’ll find joy,
Life is just to complicated if your living outside the hoi polloi.
But mom and dad taught me that learning words was cheap,
And that the ability to use them well was a skill that I could keep.
So I learned how to manipulate them and use them as a toy,
And send them out to all my friends living in the hoi polloi.
Hoi Polloi Loses The Way
You gravitate away
from the Lamb
who saved your Day
turn back;for you've
lost your way!
Yet, fear not,
for the Prodical Son
wound up with
a glorious day!
McCuen Copyright October 2008
Hoi Polloi: Kick it Up a Notch!
You must do more
or your grades wont get
the needed score
don't you see
what could be in store?
Now, get your degree;
make sure you don't flop
or you could wind up pushing the mop!
McCuen Copyright October 2008