If you’ve withstood these lines, you should
Question your sanity.
I shall go on some more from here,
So if more you should want to hear:
Detroit’s the vicinity.

The hall is musty, to the eaves;
’tis damp but not a dump
A group of people prays inside,
Together in a clump.

The big boat gone, lingers the shock
And so, what do to now?
The time hath come to move on from there,
So they will, they avow.

They still have faith, though all are dead;
This be not a day of cheer. . .
Prayers punctuated by wails
For each lost soul so dear.
They’d never seen aught light to them
Who had left from the pier.

Their skeletons adorn the crags
Of the lake wide and long,
Not up above but down below
Where the fish and not the fishermen go.
(I shall soon speak of the songs.)

“Dear lord,” the priest says, “though you took
These men below to die,
Those left behind will carry on.”
Many were the eyes non-dry.

Bells you will hear upon a ship;
When them you will have heard,
It might be time to kip (what did he say?)—
That’s “sleep,” a British word.

Upon land the church bells chimeth on,
Once for each of the dead.
Twenty-nine bells were heard that day,
So where has this all led?

------------------------------------------------

A man whose sound is quite renowned
Sat down one day and wrote
A song about the men who had drowned
On that ill-fated boat.
Now we have found that there abound
Take-offs where the folks vote.

The site aswirl; about the ship
That way back when went down.
A while ’tis still; then come more still;
No one seemeth to frown.

It hath been, lo, many a week
Since Patrick started it.
And then a frenzy did arise—
Came a Fitzgerald fit.

Joined in many a girl and boy
And crazy they did go.
Many a song, many a style
Of parodies did show
Where much funny stuff one can see.
Its name I think you know.

Math is not a strong suit for me,
But now, from where I stand,
I count 25 ’bout the boat
That came from Patrick’s hand.

He took a tune done by a man
Whom many would avow:
A great songwriter, and folks play
His music even now.

I speak, ye ken, of Jimmy Webb
Who hath penned a panoply
Of ballads and other such tales;
“Phoenix” is the first we see.

Patrick applied parody power
To take this tune and turn
It ’round as if it had been told
RE: boat of no return.

The madness began to expand
Until it seemed that each
Person who wrote a parody
Was doing “If XY wrote ‘The. . .”
This, no peach but a reach.

Pat penned a score—no, even more;
Also doing his share
Was Michael Pacholek, who vied
And got full 8 up there.
Perhaps ’tis too early to tell
If more he will prepare.

I was one below, at seven—
Then seven more for me.
I think I have outdone myself
With this monstrosity.

I took on the “Mariner” beast,
And ’twas insanity.
I hope you’ll not think me a jerk
For my seven-part spree.

Now, for all those who did the work
Of parody each day,
To do “If so-and-so had penned
‘The Wreck’,” congratulations, friends.
To Pat, who showed the way.

Farewell, farewell to this; to “Spell”
I shall return to wrest
More take-offs from Jay’s drunken yell.
’tis a shame I don’t jest.

With a Fitz fest we have been blessed,
Of the ship in a squall,
But I think the Fitz fare has just
About begun to pall.

The legend lived on at this site
In take-offs by the score.
I think all would say: “Take a rest;
This can’t go on much more.”

What Pat begun may now be done
But be ye not forlorn—
Another tunesmith may arise,
A new “What if. . .” be born.