Common Cold

Go hang yourself, you old M.

D.!

You shall not sneer at me.

Pick up your hat and stethoscope,

Go wash your mouth with laundry soap;

I contemplate a joy exquisite I'm not paying you for your visit.

I did not call you to be told My malady is a common cold.

By pounding brow and swollen lip;

By fever's hot and scaly grip;

By those two red redundant eyes That weep like woeful April skies;

By racking snuffle, snort, and sniff;

By handkerchief after handkerchief;

This cold you wave away as naught Is the damnedest cold man ever caught!

Give ear, you scientific fossil!

Here is the genuine Cold Colossal;

The Cold of which researchers dream,

The Perfect Cold, the Cold Supreme.

This honored system humbly holds The Super-cold to end all colds;

The Cold Crusading for Democracy;

The Führer of the Streptococcracy.

Bacilli swarm within my portals Such as were ne'er conceived by mortals,

But bred by scientists wise and hoary In some Olympic laboratory;

Bacteria as large as mice,

With feet of fire and heads of ice Who never interrupt for slumber Their stamping elephantine rumba.

A common cold, gadzooks, forsooth!

Ah, yes.

And Lincoln was jostled by Booth;

Don Juan was a budding gallant,

And Shakespeare's plays show signs of talent;

The Arctic winter is fairly coolish,

And your diagnosis is fairly foolish.

Oh what a derision history holds For the man who belittled the Cold of Colds!