Mantis

[elsibethann]

I have a little mantis
  who crawls around my brane.
He crept out of Atlantis
  ere it went down the drain.
    He claims to be protecting
      my tiny vacant head,
    but I think he's expecting
      to sell me to the dead.

O dead, O dead who've left the planet
in those holes beneath some granite,
  how much will you pay for me
  to this mantis from the sea?

If he want a pound of brass,
would you give it for my ass?
  If he ask for something shiny,
  will you pay it for my heiney?
If for choc'late eggs at Easter,
what amount are worth my keister?
  And when my butt's as dead as yourn,
  shall I know why I was born?

I have a curséd mantis
  up there inside my head
who drown'd the fair Atlantis
  and sold it to the dead;
    and when he's finish'd lying
      his tricksy shifty bluffing,
    before I've finish'd dying,
      he'll sell my ass for nuffing.

love,
Elsie

in my tree