The Word

In the beginning was the word Before that, no noun, no thing Then no sound was ever heard And no passing bell would ring So therefore no adjective was needed to describe it or deplore it No preposition required to be positioned right before it No verb to do something to it or say what act it was pursuing No need for an adverb to describe how well or badly it was doing Since not even one noun existed, conjunctions would have been redundant There were no things to act on and to move across the face of the fundament So the first word there had to be - was BE, and that was the very first in existence And from Genesis and Eden to Elsinore, it has had a remarkable degree of persistence Now, in the Oxford English Dictionary which is venerable institution There are 171476 full entries of words (2nd edition) all capable of elocution Of these, about one seventh are verbs, therefore there must be around 24497 give or take, to enumerate all action And that should be enough for even the most garrulous to get some satisfaction This is a limited calculation and I wouldn't want to be tied down to it We can be more free in our estimates so while we are about it, we might as well do it It seems that once BE had been exercised, the dam broke and words poured out as from a cornucopia. And verbs would soon exist in an abundance enough to carry you from here to Ethiopia Except in the culture of youth where it appears this multitude has been reduced to the deplorable "was like" To them I am tempted to say: "Learn some real verbs"; OR I would employ a phrasal such as 'On-your-bike!' The possibilities are now endless particularly if you include the phrasal Giving us enough elan vital to at least maintain a metabolism basal So to whoever first said BE, whether God or someone with similar propensities though another name or description: I say Well done! I couldn't in my wildest dreams with a wish to create a rich life and culture, have produced a better prescription