“Said Hanrahan”
January 30, 2011 § 1 Comment
“After you have had children and grandchildren and have lived in the land a long time—if you then become corrupt and make any kind of idol, doing evil in the eyes of the LORD your God and provoking him to anger, I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you this day that you will quickly perish from the land…You will not live there long, but will certainly be destroyed.” Deuteronomy 4:25-27
“We’ll all be rooned!” Isaiah said
In accent most forlorn,
Or other words of sim’lar dread
Til most his voice was gawn.
“We’ll all be rooned” he said “And here’s
The woolly reason why:
We’ve wandered off like sheep for years
And gone a mile awry!”
The congregation stood about
Alistening to his oracles.
They gave a disconcerted pout,
And scratched their noggins’ follicles.
“I thought we were immune from roon”
A fella said with frown.
“He really saying all we’re do-in’
Wrong will bring us down?”
“He seems to be” another spoke
In manner sort of mellow.
“He’s giving us a red hot poke,
this old Isaiah fellow.”
“D’ya think the roon’ll happen soon?”
another said all glum.
“I’ve set aside this afternoon
to correspond with Mum.”
“A roon is never opportune.”
A friend was heard to say.
“A ru-in rooned my honeymoon:
Twas over in a day!”
A sort of resignation fell
On all at the remark,
As everyone around a well,
Was chewing bits of bark.
“Without a doubt a ru-in’s brew-in”
Spoke the older sages.
“The Lord has prob’ly bin a-stew-in’
Over it for ages.”
“He’ll surely be purshoon the roon
Til all the people be jipped.
He’ll prob’ly send a big ti-phoon
To blow us back to Egypt”
“A storm, for sure” a youth replied,
“Twould be enough draconian.
But as for me – a hunch inside
Says something Babylonian.”
And so the speculations ran,
Or words, perhaps, alike ‘em,
As Abraham’s extended clan,
Awaited God to strike ‘em.
But no one, not a bod, among
The little controversy,
Was humbled in his soul, or stung
To ask the Lord for mercy.
And so He sent the dreaded roon,
Although he wished to right ‘em:
A mighty big and mean platoon
Of soldiers went to smite ‘em.
It swaggered down from Babylon,
and tore the place asunder.
It killed and burned and jumped upon,
And carried off its plunder.
And as they saw the wreckage strewn,
Across the promised land,
A people cried “We’ve all bin rooned
At God Almighty’s hand!”
The Banjo Bible 
This poem is based on Isaiah 1:1-4, 5:1-17, and 2 Kings 17:7-20. The words of Isaiah in the poem’s first two verses are very rough paraphrases. All the other quotations are imagined.