Maddening,
what you hear these days!
Cute little bunny,
Looking so funny,
Runny, runny, runny
Farmer with a gunny!
So what’s so unusual, why is this so absurd?
Let me tell you what the bunny heard.
But, before I do, let me tell
To where he ran, like a bat out of hell…….
Out of breath he scampered up a hill.
The farmer stopped for his gun to refill.
Under barbed wire ran the rabbit with a thrill
As a shot ricochéd on the wire with a shrill.
Exhausted and scared
To the foxes den he dared.
Down in the dark leaving the farmer all annoyed.
Now being eaten by Fox he must avoid.
“Don’t eat me he said with a plea,
and I’ll tell you why farmer was a chasing me.”
Fox grinned and looked down at his quarry
“Tell me quick, or ya gonna be sorry”.
Rabbit accounted his terrible tale
But asylum was to no avail.
Fox listened and learned, worried and fraught
Then he ate poor rabbit – without a thought.
Now fox became messenger of the night,
With whom shall he share these tidings of fright?
He sneaked out of his den
And thought he’d first take a hen.
He went down to the farm, his usual place
But farmer saw him and took up chase.
Like a dancer eluded fox the shots
As he ran up the hill in rapid fox-trots.
The repeated fire was getting near
Fox ran passed his den in terrible fear.
Through some bushes and down to the stream
Now in safety it did just seem.
He collapsed in a heap on the river’s side
And up to him a viper did slide.
He hissed in a venomous way,
Fox, exhausted, could not run away.
“You have some news for me I hear,
Tell me now and you’ll have nothing to fear.”
Fox related the rabbits story,
making his own role full of glory.
Snake coiled, and hissed, and struck…..
Fox may as well have been hit by a truck.
The poison pulled, in pain, his body together
Till he was no more than flesh, fur and leather.
But the secret was now in the grasp of the snake.
He swam up river and entered the lake.
Wriggle, wriggle through mud and slime
On to the bank, just in time.
Up came an animal he had never seen loose
It was his bad luck that it was Mongoose.
Tired from the swim he could just recount the facts
Now all he wanted was to just relax.
But Mongoose gave him a terrible fight
One that could have gone on all night
But the sleepy viper was beat
And Mongoose smiled as he began to eat.
The responsibility was now Mongoose’s burden
The story shocked him as he heard – an’
He just wanted to get it quickly off his chest.
And didn’t want to end up just like the rest.
So to whom should he go with this dreadful information
It must go out to the whole animal nation.
He ran as quickly as he could
And ended up in a very dark wood.
His eyes were not yet accustomed to the dark
But he saw a tiny flash of red just like a spark.
He spoke with black widow and told her the tale
Then she grinned an evil look and her fangs did impale.
Was not long before mongoose was dead.
Now a spider held the truth in it’s head.
It crawled up the tree at it’s own slow pace
Ignoring the concerns of the whole animal race.
But still alive she is today
Because she did not have to pay
The price for listening in to other’s conversations
And for nosy little observations.
What was it that rabbit had heard
What syllable, what word?
Farmer was not an intellectual soul
What he said was generally, on the whole,
Rather inane, stupid, banal, of no use.
Or it was cursing and other abuse.
He said that night to the farmers wife.
“They’re all gonna loose their life,
those poor animals out there.”
And rabbit suddenly became aware.
He run off without hearing more
Because Farmer suddenly came to the door.
He’d been talking about his cows and bull
Having pumped them all to the full
With a paste
Of other animal waste.
BSE for breakfast, lunch and dinner –
Man after profit is not always a winner!
Copyright © 01.06.1983 – Kevin Mahoney