Tuesday, March 17, 2026

Pericalypses: A (Q)want'lem Life in a Perfect Vacuum

Response to a Grub Street Tale from Joachim Fersengeld:

Advice to the Grub Street Verse-writers by
 Jonathan Swift

Ye poets ragged and forlorn,
Down from your garrets haste;
Ye rhymers, dead as soon as born,
Not yet consign'd to paste;

I know a trick to make you thrive;
O, 'tis a quaint device:
Your still-born poems shall revive,
And scorn to wrap up spice.

Get all your verses printed fair,
Then let them well be dried;
And Curll must have a special care
To leave the margin wide.

Lend these to paper-sparing Pope;
And when he sets to write,
No letter with an envelope
Could give him more delight.

When Pope has fill'd the margins round,
Why then recall your loan;
Sell them to Curll for fifty pound,
And swear they are your own.

Adventures in Space-Time

5 comments:

  1. Yawn.
    Lem's "Trash-verse".

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    Replies
    1. It's the packaging that makes the disposable product inside "desirable". Put water in a disposable bottle and stand on a dusty hot street corner. You'll soon get rich. No one will drink free water from the hose 3 feet away.

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  2. Meh.

    Tichiy not authentic (who's that? Polish dr.Who?)
    And too many minutae things from current reality Lem disliked.

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