A MODEST EXAMPLE OF RECURSION

(Tune: "Hymn to Unknown Heroes")

A filker's singing on the stage with a guitar in her hands,
Of unicorns and dragons and of far and fabled lands.
And down there in the audience There's the scratching of a pen;
It's the Filksong Pastiche Merchant at his evil tricks again.

CHORUS
Line by line he checks each verse, one more time, one more time,
Scratches out and breathes a curse, need a rhyme, one more rhyme,
Though he knows he's doing wrong he's been at it far too long,
Every day he steals a song, it's a crime, it's a crime.

It's after midnight at the con and the stairwell's none too bright,
But listening to the singing you don't care about the light.
Then halfway through a soulful song you hear a desperate cry;
It's the Filksong Pastiche Merchant and his biro's just run dry.

CHORUS
Line by line he checks each verse, one more time, one more time,
Scratches out and breathes a curse, need a rhyme, one more rhyme,
Though he knows he's doing wrong he's been at it far too long,
Every day he steals a song, it's a crime, it's a crime.

He never sings or plays himself, he cannot hold a note,
He leaves that up to those by whom the songs were really wrote.
But late at night when lyric sheets in biro get passed round,
It's the Filksong Pastiche Merchant, who never makes a sound.

CHORUS
Line by line he checks each verse, one more time, one more time,
Scratches out and breathes a curse, need a rhyme, one more rhyme,
Though he knows he's doing wrong he's been at it far too long,
Every day he steals a song, it's a crime, it's a crime.

Here's a health to all you filkers who write songs both grave and gay,
And the people who collect them and make tapes for us to play.
And if when you are singing you should see a biro flashed,
It's the Filksong Pastiche Merchant and your song's just been rehashed.

CHORUS
Line by line he checks each verse, one more time, one more time,
Scratches out and breathes a curse, need a rhyme, one more rhyme,
Though he knows he's doing wrong he's been at it far too long,
Every day he steals a song, it's a crime, it's a crime.

(Change tune: "Crystal Singer")
The lorries in the street outside cacophonously beep,
And rouse me from another night of restless, haunted sleep.
The Filksong Pastiche Merchant now must gather up his wits,
To take a song of beauty and then hack it into bits.