Old Woolen Cap (Old City Bar, Paul O'Neill)

Well, it's been quite a year. Quite a month, too, in which I felt far more frazzled than I would like and have often found myself questioning my purpose in this world. I took a M*A*S*H personality survey a while back that determined the character I most resembled was Father Mulcahy. At the time, I was a bit disappointed I didn't get Radar, who's always been my favorite character on that show, which is one of the dearest to my heart. But the more I think about it, the more I think I am like Father Mulcahy, timid, mousy, well-intentioned but with a task far more nebulous than that of a surgeon or a company clerk. His job is ministry, but it's hard to measure the impact he has, hard to know if he's making any difference at all.

This filksong is in essence a retelling of the episode Dear Sis, which is creeping up to become possibly my all-time favorite episode of M*A*S*H. It's a tribute to Father Mulcahy and all those like him - and who hasn't questioned his or her usefulness now and again? But the important thing is that we persevere, doing whatever we feel is right and good for us to do as best we can. It's to the tune of Trans-Siberian Orchestra's Old City Bar, a gorgeous song that makes epic a small moment of human kindness.

May the end of the year be a blessed one for all of you, and here's to renewed inspiration and purpose in the coming year and all those that follow.

Old Woolen Cap

In the midst of a war
The doctors deplored
For the lives that were shattered
As boys became men,
Sat a chaplain, contrite,
Huddled sadly to write
A note to his sister,
Confessing his sin.

This war's toll was appalling.
The Father was falling
A victim to thoughts of inadequacy.
Surrounded by pain, he
Implored to see plainly
That he had brought light to someone in misery.

He was seething inside
When he fruitlessly tried
To subdue a young man
Enraged to the core.
When the boy dealt a blow,
The priest punched him, and so
Was filled with remorse,
And he loathed himself more

Agony stained his face
As he begged God for grace,
So he was a sad sight
At the party that night
Till the new guy in town,
Who'd been wearing a frown,
Got the gift the priest said
The clerk ought to send 'round.

Standing by, so beguiling,
Young Radar was smiling,
And Charles, who had spurned his superior air,
Said, eyes spilling over,
"You saved me. You lowered
A bucket into the well of my despair.
And you raised me up, Father, to the light of day."
Father John was so touched, didn't know what to say.
So he mused to himself, wholly humbled and awed,
How this old woolen cap brought his message from God.

And in this distant place, though he'd felt grim defeat,
Christmas never had tasted so filling and sweet.
Father John felt the light of that first Christmas star,
Unencumbered by doubts that had plagued him thus far.
He was only a man,
And he sometimes did wrong,
But at last he knew that he belonged.

Gentle Father Mulcahy,
On that winter's day,
Realized his importance and pledged to hold fast.
He silently savored
The fruits of his labor,
Having found in himself a good shepherd at last.

As the grateful priest smiled,
He remained unaware
That the Lord wasn't done
With His answer to prayer.
Then he heard as Hawkeye
Raised his voice and his drink
In a toast to a guy
Who helped souls not to sink.

And he lauded the way
Father John Patrick spread
Decency, how his strength
Helped disperse gloom and dread.
He called for a prayer
They sang earnestly:
"Dona nobis pachem."
Give us peace, give us peace.

As the snow began falling,
The wounded came calling.
While "give us peace" lingered like frost in the air,
The priest carried on. God had shown John
How a meek chaplain might lift a soul from despair.

The Ballad of Harry Potter (Suicide Is Painless, Johnny Mandel / Mike Altman)

I've been meaning to versify about everybody's favorite boy wizard for quite some time, so here is my first Harry Potter parody, set to Suicide is Painless, which happens to be the theme song of my favorite sit-com, M*A*S*H. This song fits in somewhere between the end of the second book and the beginning of the third. More will follow, I'm sure...

The Ballad of Harry Potter

Well, when he was a youngster, Harry's
Room was underneath the stairs.
His uncle Vernon stashed him there,
Which Harry thought was quite unfair.

Now Harry Potter's famous.
His nemesis is nameless.
With Ronald and Hermione he'll get by.

When giant-hearted Hagrid came
And called the Potter boy by name,
Informing Harry of his fame,
His life would never be the same.

Now Harry Potter's famous.
His nemesis is nameless.
With Ronald and Hermione he'll get by.

He boarded the Hogwarts Express
And soon heard Dumbledore's address.
No longer plagued by loneliness,
He rescued Neville from distress.

Now Harry Potter's famous.
His nemesis is nameless.
With Ronald and Hermione he'll get by.

When stealthiness was called for, he
Embraced invisibility,
But Quidditch fans could clearly see
His skill as he was flying free.

Now Harry Potter's famous.
His nemesis is nameless.
With Ronald and Hermione he'll get by.

His taped-up glasses, lightning scar
And escapades in flying cars
Have helped him to become a star,
But he's not vain - at least so far.

Now Harry Potter's famous.
His nemesis is nameless.
With Ronald and Hermione he'll get by.

His pre-teen life's been torn apart
By Snape and Quirrell and Lockhart
And others skilled in the Dark Arts.
His greatest battle soon will start.

Now Harry Potter's famous.
His nemesis is nameless.
With Ronald and Hermione he'll get by.

A Sestina Celebrating Radar O'Reilly

I really ought to spread these out a bit more, but I'm in a poem-posting mood, so here's another one. I wrote it a couple years ago in response to an assignment in poetry class requiring us to write a sestina about a sit-com character. I chose Radar because M*A*S*H is my favorite sit-com and he is my favorite character. Without further ado...

Radar

Like a little lost boy, he clutches his teddy bear
In his arms, nervously wiping his grimy glasses.
The war wants him to grow up fast, but he declines
To change. He wraps his naivety around him like a warm
Blanket to shield him from cold reality. High
School never prepared him for the arrival of choppers

Laden with wounded. The first time he saw it, his choppers
Could not consume the chow in the Mess. He simply could not bear
The sight of so much pain. Abandoning his dinner, he high-
Tailed it outside to get some fresh air. "You dropped your glasses,"
The kindly colonel called. He smiles at the memory. How warm
And fatherly was Blake. But now his face is creased with lines

Of sorrow, recalling the descent behind enemy lines –
No, the Sea of Japan should have been safe – of the chopper
Carrying his mentor home. How his hand, practically still warm
From that last handshake, trembled as he gripped the telegram, bare-
Ly able to read it through the fog of his tear-stained glasses!
If only he’d made it home, he would feel no guilt in his high

Opinion of Potter, a horse-lover and high-
Ly efficient commander who frequently inclines
An ear to the clairvoyant corporal behind those glasses,
Who has come to rely on the unexpected cry: “Choppers!”
Hawkeye, B.J., Charles...all rush to the deceptively bare
Field which, moments later, is filled with the stench of warm

Blood as wounded are unloaded. Today is a reprieve. Warm
rays of sun filter through the window; he squints as he writes, “Hi,
Ma...” He pauses, seeking soothing words to fill the bare
Page. And so he writes, filling his letter with lines
Of pleasantries, letting cheerfulness mask the dread of choppers
Looming ominously in his mind. Delicate as glass, his

Words protect her. “...Love, Walter,” he finishes. His glasses
Fog at the thought of home, and he seeks refuge in the warm
Fur of Fluffy, grateful that Hawkeye refused to chop her
Up beyond repair. The gentle rabbit’s presence is a high
Point in his homesick days. Stroking her, he imagines the lines
Of crops in Iowa, the newborn calves, his bedroom – bare.

A rabbit and a teddy bear, a pair of filthy glasses...
They are his only lines to his home, so distant and warm.
Sighing, he sips a Grape Ne-Hi and awaits the choppers.