Cousin Elmer tends the family tree,
Shaping it to topiary rare
And strange as he trims a little here and there
And lops some ugly branches drastically.
It’s crystal clear to him that we’re
descended
From renowned figures of a heroic time,
Our annals innocent of any crime.
His usual skepticism is suspended
When he turns his eye upon our heritage.
Not that he means to practice a deception,
He only has an immaculate conception
Of what we must have been in a former age.
But look at us. Isn’t the evidence
plain
That we are nothing special, never were?
Our history is ordinary and bare,
Our biographies boring as eight days of rain.
It’s improbable even to suppose
He’d ever find a drop of noble blood,
Tracing roots of a dull ignoble wood.
The jackpine never did put forth a rose.
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