That Big Hill Poem by jim hogg

With a wide eyed sausage dog
and an elderberry gun
I felt the lure of Hollywood
and set off at a run.
We lived on porridge oats mixed in
with dolly mixture sweets.
We drank the dew from fir tree cones
and slept beneath tin sheets

And all the would be poets rhymed
as we passed them in the night.
Their hats were thirty inches high;
their eyes were full of sight.
They murmured incantations like
"they're off to that big hill"
And though the dog was dragging me
we both were standing still.

But soon we left old scotland's shore
to a forty gun salute.
I rowed our row boat backwards
and the dog smoked a cheroot.
Lets take the long way round I said
and take them by surprise.
I'm sure that dog was smiling
as he smoked me in the eyes.

In the Bay of Biscay Ed -
as that sausage dog was called-
aligned his ears with Africa
and gradually grew bald.
The sun was going up and down;
the sky kept spinning round.
We sat there playing dominoes
and couldn't hear a sound.

'til the wind blew cold and fierce
as we sailed around Cape Horn.
In waves as high as chestnut trees
Ed's thirteen pups were born.
We fed them albatross and oats,
encased in salt and ice.
And all they had to drink was rain,
so pure it sure was nice.

With a northwards glance I caught a glimpse
of something to the west.
A multi-coloured flying fish
which hit me on the chest.
The food was growing scarcer
with no water left to sup.
Big scary birds were looking down
and sharks were looking up,

but the boat was skimming swiftly
as that baldy dog rowed hard.
The scenery was picturesque;
the pups sent off a card.
But Ed was running out of steam
and soon began to snore.
We headed for Galapagos
to spend a night ashore.

And there on those peculiar isles
we chose to set up home,
for I was sick of rowing,
and the pups were keen to roam.
And soon that dream of Hollywood
was something we forgot.
The pups all grew up happy
on the far Galapagos.

And the never ending story
of thirteen pups and Ed,
it never ended there because
those pups all bred and bred.
An ice age came and went before
they managed to break free.
Their beagle expedition
soon was sailing o'er the sea.

(chorus)

Oh they're off to that big hill, big hill,
all the poets said.
Where all the famous people live
inside a giant head.
The hill where all the letters stand
for anything but good.
That wide eyed sausage dog and him
to look for Hollywood.

2011