Mark Langlais &The Gastric Band

Escher – a good sketcher

My teacher told me Escher had a studio in Esher

And would feature on the local radio

With a horse he called Horatio

And thus he changed the ratio

Of fine art to the dryly spoken word.

He'd ride into the sunset when the sun it was a'dawning

In the morning-time when snoring birds awoke.

He would slope off with our eyes on him to join with the horizon

For it seemed he was a solitary bloke

And then he'd draw an image of a bird that was a hand

Or maybe ampersands all standing in a row

The next day he'd return to find

He'd been replaced, but never mind,

His horse had metamorphosed, chewed the cud -  

It's coat was more a vest and now demoralized, depressed

It lowed a little, leaving highs aside.

Escher sighed to see the sunset with the sun that was a'dawning

As morning swiftly changed to afternoon

To hear the dark slip in and cover daylight like a stain

As it invades the helpless shore and tide comes in

And still he'd draw his images of birds that turned to hands

Or all those ampersands still standing in a row.

Now that he is dead and only images remind us

Of the genius he held within his head

Mathematically sound we could all play him in the round

And claim within a square he's a round peg.

He'd cry out in surprise to find he'd climbed the steps to heaven

And invariably had ended down in hell

Where the audience would squirm and writhe and act out endless torment

In the hot and fetid regions where they dwell

And now he'd be too shocked to draw the stock of flocks of hands

Or those poor ampersands all stranded in a row.  

All stranded in a row, those poor ampersands

All stranded in a row, those poor ampersands.

Mark Langlais 2016