An Email to Your Mother

[jducoeur]

An Email to Your Mother
(to the tune of "A Chat With Your Mother", by the Berrymans)

By Justin du Coeur
(Thanks to msmemory for the idea)

There are spammers with their zombie networks, hiding out in Russia,
Pushing penny stocks for firms that make wi-fi-equipped kazoos,
Off'ring ways to grow the size of every bit of genitalia,
It's from them I would expect to get this email, not from you!

  I sit down to read some mail,
  My stuffed Inbox begins to wail,
  I can't control what family members
  Send to one another,
  But I don't want to get all this junk
  Mail from you, please, mother!

There's a kid whose dying wish is postcards from each living person,
And a gift from Mr. Gates if you just let this mail on through,
With a pyramid of blessings if you forward sixteen copies,
It's from them I would expect to get this email, not from you!

There are phishers who would love to steal your every hidden secret,
Using expiration notices most patently untrue,
With a million dollar lottery awaiting in Nigeria,
It's from them I would expect to get this email, not from you!

There are hackers lurking just outside your router, sending packets
All designed to breach your firewall, and then begin to spew
Twenty thousand little worms each taking over other networks,
It's from them I would expect to get this email, not from you!

There are those who click on every link their email programs show them,
Whose computers fill with spyware stuck on their hard drives like glue,
Having no IT department save their poor hard-working children,
It's from them I would expect to get this email, not from you!

(Disclaimer: this isn't really about my own mother, who is usually reasonably restrained.  But I was considering what I needed to warn her about as I get her a new computer and her own internet connection, and msmemory said, "At the danger of you not getting any sleep tonight -- you could tell her in the form of a Berryman song."  This was the result...)

Comments

[calygrey.livejournal.com]

Did you get any sleep??

[jducoeur]

Actually, it was okay. I had to scribble one line down on a piece of paper by the bedside just before turning out the lights, but other than that I managed to do about half before bed and the rest after getting up...

[eclecticmagpie.livejournal.com]

Very nice. Polish up the scansion a little bit, and turn it over to a good singer; you could have a fannish hit.

[jducoeur]

Actually, the scansion's intentionally a smidgeon rough at line start: the original is much the same way. Other than that, I *think* it scans clean. (Well, okay -- you have to stuff in "Nigeria", but I think it works: it's similar to "Anchorage" in the original, which also requires a squished syllable...)

[eclecticmagpie.livejournal.com]

It's not the intentionally squished syllables that bother me; there's something about "All designed to breach your firewall" that bugs me -- and now I realize that it's not actually scansion, but something else. Anyway, it's a well done piece, deserving of being shared with a larger audience.

[jducoeur]

there's something about "All designed to breach your firewall" that bugs me

That verse is the only place where I really have phrases crossing lines, which doesn't happen in the original, IIRC. I might yet change it for that reason, but for now I'm decently content with it -- it's a tad blank-versish, but I like the flow.

Anyway, it's a well done piece, deserving of being shared with a larger audience.

Thanks...

[dagonell.livejournal.com]

Brilliant! Just as funny as the original!
-- Dagonell

[jducoeur]

Thanks...

[cellio]

Very nice! I'd sing it. :-)

"stuck on their hard drives like glue" is feeling awkward to me, I think because the natural stress beat is on "their", which feels wrong textually. I don't have an alternate to propose, though, and it's a minor thing.