Plague Songs - Burial / by Rich Hobbs

Pepys buried a Parmesan

During the Great Fire

But what would you elect to save

From Fate’s Capricious Ire?

Rosetti buried poetry;

Dean Swift? A Houyhnhnm!

Dylan Thomas, twenty pints of beer

Full up to the brim!

The Pharoahs buried wives and slaves

And cats and grain and gold;

The wary bury diaries full of tales

Not to be told.

A pirate buries treasure;

A squirrel buries nuts;

Speculators bury surpluses

To see them through the gluts.

What should you save by burying?

A book? Some wine? A glove?

Your passport, or a locket

Of the one you truly love?

Some hair from your first baby?

Your old dad’s broken pipe?

The clutter of a lifetime,

Or your life until it’s ripe?

And what does Boris Johnson love,

He buries and he saves?

Why! 50,000 citizens

Now buried in their graves.