BEING, n. A state of perpetual decay resistant to all treatments, including pickling.
“Like porous pots of copper,”
Glum Descartes, to the tinker,
Said, “My theories hold no water.
How does this befit a thinker?
“Insipid is my method,
Untrue my bent perception,
And my logic’s iron reason
I find founded in deception.
“By God alloyed, my mettle,
Softened by the flame of doubt,
Becomes the image of this kettle
With its bottom melted out.
“And so untempered isness
Last permits a final twist;
I’m beside myself, distressed
That I myself may not exist!”
Here Descartes the smith espied,
Past a rondeau in his hand,
And gently rapping on its side
Rejoined, “I tink, therefore I am.”
Adamantius Clough