Do I have to go to school today?

I would much rather stay at home and play

My time is usurped by the school by decree

In a pointless pursuit of pure pedagogy

I start out my day with hallowed history

Though why so is a quite mundane mystery

Pompous princes meet callous kings

Ridiculous rhymes, it’s a memory thing

The many wives that King Henry wedded

Poor Catherine Howard, she was beheaded

And then, alas, it must be maths

A million meaningless gruesome graphs

Arithmetic, angles, algebra and then

Calculate this to the power of ten.

French, ah the language of Descartes and Voltaire

But France? I doubt I will ever go there

Masculine miel and feminine fleur

The need for this language will never occur

And English, oh my what an end to the day

Poets and prose and a poor Priestley play

I would never read it, not one second look

I dread to see Shakespeare adorning a book

And that, my child, is why school is import

All that you told me are things that were taught

You quoted of kings of maths and of French

Your ability to alliterate exudes eloquence

Philosophers too, you are nobody’s fool

And that, my child, is why you must go to school