Jake the Cake March 6, 2008

 

 

Now a story, so tragic, so horrid, I’ll tell

of malevolent magic  which one day befell

two good people who lived just outside Motherwell.

 

They had waited nine months for the birth of their child

the father was loving, the mother was mild

the name they’d selected for their first-born was Jake

but the scans hadn’t seen that his head was a cake.

 

At the moment our hero emerged from the womb

the mother gasped, wept, and fell into a swoon

the midwife boiled custard and then called for a spoon

 

consultants and researchers pored through libraries and books

then turned to great philosophers and modern pastry cooks

the answer, as it turned out, was the mother’s awful diet

For every time she’d seen a cake she felt compelled to try it

 

Jake’s mother had abstained from booze, tobacco and blue cheese

Instead she always spent her time in French patisseries

and her excessive intake gave Jake “Gateau-Head disease”

 

Four days old, Jake’s head grew mould and reeked of putrefaction

The doctor cried “we must be bold and take some drastic action

He’s past his best, his almonds blanched, his raisins have turned pale

I hate to have to tell you this, he really is quite stale”

 

His cream transfusions failed to stop Jake’s journey into night

and at his wake there was a rather strange satanic sight

when relatives who nibbled said “Jake’s jam still tastes alright.”

 

 

 

Paul Hughes 2008