The Wisdom of Archy

Counterpunch just put up a slightly hysterical yet troubling column by that borderline wacko Paul Craig Roberts, all about how the neocons have put us on a path to nuclear war and "the hegemony of the cockroach." I have to admit it seems a little sad to think of my species overthrown as apex despoiler of the planet, but cockroach rule might not be so bad. Just imagine how much better off we'd all be if GWB had taken this bit of poetic advice from the sagacious Archy.

"Prudence"

i do not think a prudent one
will ever aim too high
a cockroach seldom whips a dog
and seldom should he try

and should a locust take a vow
to eat a pyramid
he likely would wear out his teeth
before he ever did

i do not think the prudent one
hastes to initiate
a sequence of events which he
lacks power to terminate

for should i kick the woolworth tower
so hard i laid it low
it probably might injure me
if it fell on my toe

i do not think the prudent one
will be inclined to boast
lest circumstances unforseen
should get him goat and ghost

for should I tell my friends i d drink
the hudson river dry
a tidal wave might come and turn
my statements to a lie

From The Annotated Archy and Mehitabel by Don Marquis, edited with notes and introduction by Michael Sims, Penguin Books, 2006.

(Click here on the off chance you want to be subjected to my bloviation about Archy.)