English Language Bastardized Poem by David Harris

Isn’t it unfortunate how
the English language is bastardized
to suit someone’s twisted mind?
How good words cannot be used
in their proper context
without someone looking strangely
and giving a stupid grin.
Years ago, when I was at school
a beaver was a small animal with a flat tail
that lived in water and built dams.
Now most kids know its meaning as
describing a woman’s gentiles.
In England, we sometimes have faggots for tea
and again this had been corrupted from
food you eat to describing someone’s sexual gender.
Gay is another word that is taboo.
You will get strange looks if you used it in its proper context.
If I wrote a title forty years ago, I was gay
everyone knew that I was feeling happy
and not what it means today.
The list of bastardized words go on and on
and I wonder what the next word from our dictionaries
that will enter that no go area of words we cannot use,
being bastardized to suit some one’s twisted mind.


11 October 2009