The controversy raging over the question of leg-theory bowling in cricket inevitably reminds one that the game of life is very much like that. Oh, what a pleasant game is life When we are bravely batting And glorying in skill and strife. We scorn defensive patting As Fate sends down the easy ones We set the ball a-soaring Straight to the fence and pile up runs And go on scoring, scoring. A week it lasts, a month, a year -- Ten years if luck holds steady No crafty trick may wake our fear, For every move we're ready No matter how the ball is bumped. We are so sure, so clever We can't be caught or bowled or stumped We're set! We're in forever! But comes a time, as I have found, When in our carefree playing, Life's game in this vast cricket ground Grows suddenly dismaying. Just as we think we're set to peg Away, thro' centuries rolling, Fate shifts his fieldsmen to the leg And starts in body bowling!
"Den"
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Copyright © Perry Middlemiss 2002 |