Classic Poem

A Topsy-Turvy world is this,
Each walks upon his head,
And woodcocks, by the dozen, shoot
The sportsmen they should dread.

It is the calves who roast the cooks,
And men are ridden by horses;
On education and on light
The Catholic owl discourses.

The herring is a sans-culotte;
Bettina falsehood flees.
And Puss-in-boots upon the stage
Is acting Sophocles.

An ape has built a Pantheon
For German sons of glory;
Massmann of late has combed his hair —
The journals give the story.

The German bears, grown atheists bold,
Their former faith are spurning;
French parrots, on the other hand,
Good Christians all are turning.

The Moniteur of Uckermark
Would seem with madness smitten:
A dead man, on a living one,
An epitaph has written.

Brothers! Who swims against the stream
Will but in vain distress him!
Come, climb the Tempelhof hill, and cry,
" Long live the King! God bless him! "