BAD BARD POETRY
Shipwrecked
Have no fear it’s unsinkable
The staggering boson cried
Just get you down below decks
And the gathering storm we’ll ride
So a huddle of terrified passengers
Anxiously searched each other’s eyes
As they stumbled down amidships
Praying the pitching and tossing subside
Full ahead both, rang the order
From the bridge to the engine room
The chief engineer took the signal
And the ship gathered speed in the gloom
This flagship was the ship of state
Sailing under a new masters rules
But the crew knew it for what it always was
And called it the ship of fools.
The owners of the line had been ousted
By a gang of landlubbing crooks
Who had no care for vessel or sail
Their business was cooking the books
So now the ship was packed to the gunnels
And passengers crowded the floors
But they’d not battened down the hatches
Or closed the watertight doors
The chief mate and ratings were missing
As the bow dug deep in the swell
Coxswain and boson, drunk on deck
Were doomed and washed into hell
On the bridge the deluded captain
Had dismissed the second mate
Insanely jealous of his steering
He’d not have others to navigate
He’d become a vainglorious tyrant
And with no others to take control
The ship runs headlong to the rocks
Where the tempest will reap its toll.