Monday's Poetry: The Horace Poem

by Pa Rock
Poetry Appreciator

To further illustrate the comic genius of the Monty Python troupe, this week's poetry selection is one of their creations, The Horace Poem, which is also known as The Haggis Poem.  It is a good example of Python's strange humor and general irreverence.

According to Wikipedia, haggis is:

"A savory pudding containing sheep's pluck (heart, liver, and lungs);  minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, and traditionally encased in the animal's stomach and simmered for approximately three house. " 

The Horace Poem 
by
Monty Python

Much to his Mum and Dad’s dismay
Horace ate himself one day.
He didn’t stop to say his grace,
He just sat down and ate his face.
“We can’t have this his Dad declared,
“If that lad’s ate, he should be shared.”
But even as he spoke they saw
Horace eating more and more:
First his legs and then his thighs,
His arms, his nose, his hair, his eyes…
“Stop him someone!” Mother cried
“Those eyeballs would be better fried!”
But all too late, for they were gone,
And he had started on his dong…
“Oh! foolish child!” the father mourns
“You could have deep-fried that with prawns,
Some parsley and some tartar sauce…”
But H. was on his second course:
His liver and his lights and lung,
His ears, his neck, his chin, his tongue;
“To think I raised him from the cot
And now he’s going to scoff the lot!”
His Mother cried: “What shall we do?
What’s left won’t even make a stew…”
And as she wept, her son was seen
To eat his head, his heart, his spleen.
And there he lay: a boy no more,
Just a stomach, on the floor…
None the less, since it was his
They ate it – that’s what haggis is.