Saturday 5 June 2010

Of Darkrooms

I wasn't going to own up to this, but why not? I was reading Mike Johnston's post "Life is too short for Alexander Pope" on TOP yesterday, and felt like having a little fun, so wrote the following bit of verse while the rice was cooking, and left it as a comment under the name "Alexander Pope".

Of darkrooms, dev and stop and fix, I'll sing!
A little burning is a dangerous thing,
Black skies as never were beneath the sun!
And dodging, too, tho' it be carefully done,
Creates those ghostly halo'd heads that shine
Like beacons in the murky fog of grain,
And dust! Fell dust! Tho' negatives be stored
And puff'd, the darkroom worker's quickly bored
With spotting spotty spots, and longs
For cloning; No, Johnston! Put down thy tongs,
The dreadful night of hypo is now past,
And DIGITAL's bright day has dawned, at last!

Mike was suitably amused, I'm happy to report. I wonder if it's too late to consider a career as an Alexander Pope tribute act?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes, it was amusing.

Condolences on your friend.

Bron

Martyn Cornell said...

Personally I regard Pope as an unpleasant and over-rated midget in need of a good kicking, but that may be because he was rude about beer drinkers. However, beer drinkers have the final laugh: I am sure Pope would be horrified to find there is a pub named after him just yards from where the remains of his grotto can still be seen in Twickenham.