Kubla Khan Enterprises Inc


In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A brand-new software game decree,
Where Alph, the coding river, ran
Through kludges measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests, ancient as the hills,
Paid for by the punters’ naiveté.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart the cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her software fixer!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if the graphics processors were failing,
A spew of error messages was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
The image flickered and grew very pale,
The sound card screamed that it, too, soon would fail:
And 'mid this scrunching code, at once and ever
It flung up momently the Beta version.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through game after game the coding river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
The punters’ voices prophesying war!

The shame of vanish’d coders’ pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Now is heard the mingled measure
From marketing department knaves.
It was “a miracle of rare device,
A piece of software redefining nice!”

A damsel with a computer
In a vision once I saw:
It was a Californian maid,
And on her computer she played,
Sandlot, by her aura.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight 'twould win me,
That with coding strong and long,
I would build that software true,
That perfect launch! those sessions nice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.




(with apologies to Sam)