On an ancient medical writer with a funny name
The worthy physician Soranus
Sought cures for conditions that pain us.
So what a bum rap
For that medical chap
That his sore-name should so entertain us.
On hearing Caius mispronounced
The Gardening Fellow of Caius
Exhorted the dons to be paius.
He supported the Greens
And grew nothing but beans,
Saying “Hardships are sent just to traius.”
On the Vicar of Haddenham (formerly Chaplain of Jesus College Oxford)
The good-natured Vicar of Haddenham
Loves people and never sees bad in ’em.
But the harder she tries
To see things through their eyes
The more her good offices madden ’em.
A Betjeman pastiche
[In celebration of the arrival of an attractive Fellow, here named by the pseudonym Gloria Guest, in the Jesus SCR]
The Senior Common Room’s on the alert
For Gloria’s here in a short leather skirt.
The Fellows are studiously doing their best
Not to stare at you, glare at you, Gloria Guest.
Gloria Guest, oh Gloria Guest…
The sway of her hips and the curve of her breast;
How truly our venerable College is blessed
By the beautiful, dutiful Gloria Guest.
The Fellows in Physics, in Classics, in Law
Have politely averted their eyes to the floor.
They are wary of seeming unduly obsessed:
We are weak from your loveliness, Gloria Guest.
Gloria Guest, oh Gloria Guest,
How truly, how greatly our College is blessed.
Wisteria – exquisite – blooms in the quad:
Its beauty attests to the glory of God.
