Once in a night as black as pitch
Isabel met a wicked old witch.
the witch's face was cross and wrinkled,
The witch's gums with teeth were sprinkled.
Ho, ho, Isabel! the old witch crowed,
I'll turn you into an ugly toad!
Isabel, Isabel, didn't worry.
Isabel didn't scream or scurry.
She showed no rage and she showed no rancor,
But she turned the witch into milk, and drank her.

Everybody who has a baby thinks everybody who hasn't a baby ought to have a baby,
Which accounts for the success of such plays as the Irish Rose of Abie,
The idea apparently being that just by being fruitful
You are doing something beautiful,
Which if it is true
Means that the common housefly is several million times more beautiful than me or you.

Just when you think that at least the outlook is so black that it can grow no blacker, it worsens,
And that is why I do not like the news, because there has never been an era when so many things were going so right for so many of the wrong persons.

"Baclli swarm within my portals

Such as ne'r conceived by mortals,

But, bred by scientists,

Wise and hoary in some Olympian laboratory.

Bacteria as large as mice

With feet of fire and heads of ice,

Who never interrupt for slumber

Their stomping, elephantine rumba.

( From the poem — - " The Common Cold " )"