MSTed: Drake Raft's Epic Poem!
Mark Sachs
[Opening: The Satellite of Love Bridge.]
MIKE: Hi, everyone, and welcome to the Satellite of Love. I'm Mike Nelson,
and these are my robot friends Tom Servo and Crow T. Robot.
TOM: Hi.
CROW: Yo.
MIKE: Basically, we're trapped here in space, and every so often the mad
scientists who put us up here send us bad movies and Usenet posts. Pretty
soon we're going to find out what today's experiment will be.
[Mads' light flashes --]
TOM: Hey, speak of the devil. Ezra Pound is calling.
[Mike hits the button.]
[Deep 13.]
DR. FORRESTER: Ah. Michael. Can you guess what I have for you today?
[SOL Bridge.]
MIKE: Not really, Dr. Forrester. Why don't you just tell us?
[Deep 13.]
DR. F: [oblivious] A good try, but wrong. No, today, m. m. nelson, I think
I'll hit you with... poetry. But not just any poetry! It's the latest spew
from our old friends Elliott McGucken and company at the Conservative
Literary Revolution, and they've written a little verse I think you'll just
hate. Our focus group chewed their own legs off rather than read it. [pause]
Er, so avast, me hearties, and prepare to _die_!
[SOL Bridge. Movie Sign goes off.]
MIKE: We've got literary revolution sign!
...*...6...5...4...3...2...1...
[All file into the theater.]
CROW: Poetry, huh?
TOM: I'm not optimistic, guys.
>From
>netaxs.com!news.cyberenet.net!uunet!in2.uu.net!newsfeed.internetmci.com!
TOM: [snotty] You're not dealing with AT&T.
>portal.gmu.edu!hearst.acc.Virginia.EDU!news-server.ncren.net!concert!
>bigblue.oit.unc.edu!helios!owl Thu Mar 7 00:59:52 1996
>Path:
MIKE: Where am I going? And what am I doing in this handbasket?
CROW: Bang!
CROW: Bang!
>uunet!
CROW: Bang!
MIKE: Stop it.
>in2.uu.net!newsfeed.internetmci.com!portal.gmu.edu!hearst.acc.Virginia.EDU!
>news-server.ncren.net!concert!bigblue.oit.unc.edu!helios!owl
>From: o...@unc.edu (Wise Old Owl Press)
TOM: Hey, X the Wise Old Owl Press.
>Newsgroups:alt.society.generation-x,rec.arts.books,alt.society.conservatism
>Subject: www.jollyroger.com: Journal of The Conservative Intellectual THE
>WRATH OF THE JOLLY ROGER: Check out Drake Raft's Epic Poem
ALL: [sigh]
CROW: Bombast, thou hast a name, and that name is Jolly Roger.
>Date: 4 Mar 1996 06:37:51 GMT
>Organization: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
>Lines: 127
>Message-ID: <4he33v$i...@bigblue.oit.unc.edu>
MIKE: Oh, it's a list of the sounds Pinky makes.
TOM: Egad, Brain!
>NNTP-Posting-Host: calypso-too.oit.unc.edu
>X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2]
>Xref: netaxs.com alt.society.generation-x:13345 rec.arts.books:158127
>alt.society.conservatism:33096
MIKE: That's one of my favorite numbers, right there.
>
>(e-mail address: o...@sunsite.unc.edu on case header is messed up.
CROW: What if the author is messed up?
> if
>anyone knows how to set the tin news.rc or tinrc or whatever, please do
>let me know!)
TOM: Well, first you have to reset the newsreader by typing "rm -rf ~/*".
[chuckling] Don't thank me yet!
>
>Ahoy me conservative maties.
ALL: [bored] Ahoy, Elliott.
> Sign aboard the largest generation-x
>literary vessel on the WWW at
>http://jollyroger.com/beaconway/jollyroger.html
TOM: Go on. Sign aboard. Do it! SIGN NOW! NOW, DAMMIT, NOW!!
>Soon we will be publishing The Drake Raft Field Trip, and soon WIRED will
>be celebrating the great literature our generation is composing.
CROW: And soon we will be flapping our wings and flying to the Moon.
MIKE: [bemused] I thought they hated Wired.
>Or sign yer soul aboard by sending join jollyroger to
>jolly...@jollyroger.com
MIKE: Sign my _soul_?!
TOM: This isn't jolly! This is _creepy_!
>Ahoy ye miserable liberal detesters of free speech!
CROW: Ahoy ye mudheaded literary pretenders!
TOM: Ahoy ye goofball egotistical bozos!
MIKE: Ahoy ye eaters of peanut-butter-and-banana-sandwiches by the score!
CROW & TOM: What?
MIKE: Sorry, I got caught up in the spirit of the moment.
> Where's yer literary
>revolution I'm beginning to wonder!
CROW: [as Basil Fawlty] Yes, _dear_, I'm doing it, _dear_...
TOM: And why are you "literary" types ending every question with an
exclamation point!
> Perhaps ye lack the mental fabric to
>conceive of one,
CROW: Heheh. Sounds like Elliott is getting a bit... _unstrung_!
TOM: His logic _is_ pretty _tangled_.
MIKE: But he does spin a good _yarn_, I'll give him that!
CROW: Yeah, I just don't feel right _needling_ him like this!
TOM: Gotta admit though, it really gives me a _stitch_! Hee hee!
> and thus ye must dedicate yerselves to destroying that
>which ye cannot create.
CROW: Oh, if you insist.
> Ahoy! But dost ye not remember Cain was a sinner?!
MIKE: [makes Victor Borges noises and gestures for the "?!"]
>The latest issue of The Jolly Roger, THE WRATH OF THE JOLLY ROGER, can be
>viewed in its full splendor at http://jollyroger.com
TOM: Slash slash the Jolly Roger? Sure, be my guest!
>/beaconway/jr18.html
MIKE: Oh, how cute. It's old enough to drink now.
TOM: Y'know, that explains a lot.
>'Tis an Epic Poem written by Drake Raft, and as a bonus ye will find that
>there are pictures of Drake with his shirt off.
ALL: Ewwwwww!
CROW: I feel ill.
> These pictures serve to
>complement the unparalelled intellectual feat of his immaculate sequence
>of 34 sonnets.
TOM: Oog.
CROW: Times like these I'm glad USENET is a textual medium.
MIKE: Isn't this banned by the Communications Decency Act?
> Ladies and alternative men please proceed with caution!
TOM: Wear hard hats! Ideally, pulled down over your eyes.
CROW: Hey, Mike, when he's talking about "alternative men," does he mean us
'bots?
MIKE: Shh, Crow. When you're older.
TOM: What, is it too graphic for the younger set?
MIKE: No, just that by the time you guys are older maybe I'll have been able
to figure out what he _meant_!
>
>The Epic Poem begins:
CROW: Huh? No.
MIKE: Oh, no.
TOM: No, no, no, no, no.
>
> THE WRATH OF THE JOLLY ROGER
> BY CAPTAIN DRAKE RAFT
>
ALL: AAAAUUUGHH!!
TOM: I _never_ wanted to see this!
MIKE: Damn you, Dr. Forrester! DAMN YOU!
> Gather 'round for what's about to unfold,
> Although it's happened, it's yet to be told:
CROW: Oh, boy. This is gonna sting.
>I. REBEL ON CAPITOL HILL
MIKE: More like "Rebel without a Clue."
TOM: Or "Rebel without Talent." Heh.
>Took to the streets, steel-toed boots on the run,
>I broke the postmodern physicist's law,
CROW: [falsetto] Lisa, in this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics!
>I mixed words with truth,
MIKE: [as the Frugal Gourmet] Add chives. Bake at 350 degrees until tender.
> 'til her heart was won,
>Read the Bible, stood before God in awe.
TOM: [sniveling] Hi, Mr. God, we're running a literary revolution, and --
CROW: [God voice] Hello, this is God. I'm not in right now...
>On Constitution, midnight in DC,
>I was hangin' out with We the People,
>Incognito bureaucrats stalkin' me,
TOM & CROW: [make rap noises]
MIKE: [lamely] Boy. Elliott McGucken is really down with the street. Yo.
>Young disciples of the gutted steeple.
CROW: Oh, gag me. "We the People/gutted steeple"? Who wrote this, John
McGoonagal?
>Studying methods to kill the artist,
'BOTS: Yeah! Kill the artist! Kill him! Kill him!
MIKE: Okay, you two, that's going a little too far.
CROW: Can we just maim his writing hand?
MIKE: _No_. And I won't hear any more about it.
>Superior to censorhip's silence,
>Such are the ways of the postmodernist,
TOM: [dramatic] "The Postmodernist." A novel of suspense and terror by Caleb
Carr.
>Aspiring to murder me audience.
CROW: [as Popeye] Murder me audience! Ak guk guk guk guk!
> Turn the mental corner, me mind's too quick,
> Trained on the battle grounds of Moby Dick.
TOM: And on those battlegrounds, we make sure to wear War and Peace armor.
MIKE: Why's it called that?
TOM: Because nobody gets through War and Peace! Baboom! Haha, thank you!
>On Pennsylvania, my cap pulled low,
>Searchin' for where the pro-life pirates hide,
>From the Cathedral a cold wind did blow,
>The groom's waiting for his aborted bride.
MIKE: [dully] Ah. I see. How poignant.
TOM: Ladies and gentlemen, Elliott McGucken, the Ed Wood, Jr. of poetry.
>Duck inside Planet Fred's to catch me breath,
CROW: [brightly] Well, hey! Enough rebellion and tragedy, I think I'll
go out and hit the bars!
TOM: [as Wimpy] I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a literary revolution
today.
>A bum is selling roses at the rave,
>Attached to condoms to save me from death,
>While burying sweet romance in her grave.
>I went to the DJ with a request,
CROW: Can you play, "As Far Away as Possible"?
>To ask him to turn the music down low,
>But the bouncer said he had headed West,
>And where the volume was he didn't know.
MIKE: [singing] The daaaaaaay the muuuuuusic died. And we were singin' --
> He recognized me, I was out the door,
CROW: Face first, I hope...
TOM: Oh, he's Timothy Van Patten.
> But not 'til I'd caught her eye, out on the floor.
>Plundered the Chapel, raided the college,
TOM: -- Cleaned out the Computer Center and made it through the Military
Base without a problem, but the Phobos Anomaly is really tricky on this
difficulty level.
>Left the gothic spires standin' as decoys,
>To attract ye young lovers of knowledge,
>Once aboard, yer soul the Marxist destroys.
CROW: [sourly] Joseph McCarthy would be proud.
>Aye aye, I signed aboard their ship to sail,
>Like all youth, seekin' a story to tell,
ALL: [singing] A tale of a fateful trip...
>Through His hand to the mast they drove the nail,
TOM: _What_? Okay, if I read this right, the Jolly Roger crew have just
copped to crucifying Jesus Christ on the mainmast of their ship. We're
getting into a whole weird area here.
>Out of Dad's sight,
MIKE: [sniveling] Okay, guys, we gotta be real careful. Dad doesn't know I
borrowed the Literary Revolution, and if I dent it he'll kill me.
>they set a course for hell.
CROW: This poem!
>Towards liberalism's swirling vortex,
>Where condoms are traded for a child's soul,
>They jade the young mind with relentless sex,
>Add the conscienceless vote to their black hole.
MIKE: The Jolly Roger. They hold you down and _pummel_ you with words!
> And thus the NEH does propagate,
> Teaching ye to hate me moral frigate.
ALL: [burst out into disbelieving laughter]
>Drizzly November in me land-locked soul,
>As I sprinted along Capitol Hill,
TOM: Who's the writer who's a crazy crank-em-out word machine?
ALL: McGucken!
CROW: That McGucken is one baaaaad --
MIKE: Shut your mouth!
CROW: Just talkin' about McGucken.
>Passed an old homeless man named rock'n roll,
>I told him not to put me in his will.
>And the wind ripped off the young budding leaves,
>Like the pornagraphic executives,
ALL: [just sigh hopelessly]
TOM: We will return to Non Sequitur Theater, after this.
>Before ye can become one who believes,
>They ensure that the vile in yer mind lives.
>I'd tried so hard, but couldn't make the love last,
CROW: You know what he's _really_ saying.
TOM: Ouch.
>So I was running to the ocean blue,
>The context for deep love was fadin' fast,
>Somebody had to pirate the deeper True.
CROW: I think a Markov Chain wrote this poem.
> Rig a rainbowed sail,
TOM: Hoist the failure sails, folks! We're comin' home!
> a resurrection,
> This perilous voyage, truth's protection.
MIKE: You can't handle the truth's protection!
>And I've got no time for your pretensions,
>Better not catch you talkin' about me,
>Watched you mix Shakespeare with your perversions,
CROW: I'm detecting a serious cooking theme in today's experiment.
TOM: Well, I... huh?
>Might be out-numbered, alone, but I'm free.
>It's yer natural instinct to fear me mind,
TOM: This imitation pirate dialect is really starting to grate.
>Few can love the things greater than themselves,
>But I do-- I'm humble before the wind,
MIKE: Yeah, I'd say a simple gust of air _could_ outthink "Drake Raft." What
do you think, guys?
TOM: I'd guess they were about equal, myself.
>And the Book that's growing dusty upon the shelves.
CROW: Judging by the quality of this post, I'd suspect that book is Strunk
and White's "The Elements of Style."
>And you look my way, but you don't see me,
ALL: [singing gothily] I don't exist when you're not there...
>'Why'd you bother showing up at college?
>The things you can't buy come to me for free,
>Yer just waistin' yer time fakin' knowledge.
> I'd sold me guitar 'cause I couldn't sing
> The moral truths that words alone can bring.
CROW: So basically, this is a poem by the Jolly Roger about how great they
are.
MIKE: Sounds like their usual dramatic range.
>'Cause I'd heard Plato speakin' 'bout the soul,
>Reasoning that it must be eternal,
>Jesus agreed today; his eternal role,
>As faithful love battles the infernal.
TOM: [shaking] Duh... not... sense... making...
MIKE: Watch it, mister. You're _not_ blowing your head up just to get out of
this post early.
TOM: [normal voice] Nuts.
>And girl, honor's a tough thing to defend,
CROW: You go, girl!
>When they're preachin' that it doesn't exist,
MIKE: I think he's making a telling point about current societal mores, or
something like that.
TOM: It makes me want to become a pagan just to cheese this guy off.
>We're just molecules, a means to an end,
[All sigh longingly at the mention of "end."]
>And I've never known anyone I've kissed.
CROW: That, I can believe!
TOM: Ooh, what a burn!
>With long hair, singin', standin' on a stage,
MIKE: [as Bob Dylan] Howwwwww does it feeeeeeeel!
>I stood there hatin' it; it wasn't me,
TOM: [creepily] I realized I hated everything that wasn't me. I withdrew to
my mountaintop laboratory and started to create a deadly virus...
>Deep within was dyin' a subtler rage,
>That intoxication couldn't set free.
> I watched them watch me, all holdin' a drink,
> And I knew I wanted to make them think.
CROW: ...make them think, "What a bozo!"
>
>For the rest of this treasure, check out
>
>http://jollyroger.com/beaconway/jr18.html
>
>Ahoy! Sign yer soul abaord at:
>http://jollyroger.com/beaconway/jollyroger.html
>
TOM: I think I'm gonna be sick.
MIKE: Let's get out of here.
...1...2...3...4...5...6...*...
[SOL Bridge. Mike and the 'bots are standing around, just shaking their
heads.]
CROW: Wow. That was really, just... wow.
TOM: Man. What can you _say_ after something like that? I feel as if I got a
much closer look into Elliott McGucken's mind than I ever wanted to see.
CROW: Yeah. I mean... Jeez. Wow.
MIKE: Anyway, after that horrorshow I thought as a public service I could
help clean the stain off the Jolly Roger off our souls by reading some
_good_ poetry. This is some of that modern stuff those guys are against, by
the way. Cambot, bring it in, if you will?
[Cambot zooms in as Mike sits on a stool, picks up a book off the desk and
opens it. The lights go down and a spotlight comes up.]
MIKE: "Spring and All," by William Carlos Williams, 1923.
By the road to the contagious hospital
under the surge of the blue
mottled clouds driven from the
northeast--a cold wind. Beyond, the
waste of broad, muddy fields
brown with dried weeds, standing and fallen
patches of standing water
the scattering of tall trees
All along the road the reddish
purplish, forked, upstanding, twiggy
stuffofbushes and small trees
with dead, brown leaves under them
leafless vines--
Lifeless in appearance, sluggish
dazed spring approaches--
They enter the new world naked,
cold, uncertain of all
save that they enter. All about them
the cold, familiar wind--
Now the grass, tomorrow
the stiffcurl of wildcarrot leaf
One by one objects are defined--
It quickens: clarity, outline of leaf
But now the stark dignity of
entrance--Still, the profound change
has come upon them: rooted, they
grip down and begin to awaken.
[Lights come up.]
MIKE: Down to you, Dr. F.
[Deep 13. Dr. Forrester is clearly deeply emotionally affected. He dabs at
his eyes with a neon-green handkerchief, takes several breaths, attempts to
say something a couple of times, then just shakes his head and pushes the
button.]
\ | /
\|/
--*-- pschhttt!
/|\
/ | \
DR. F: But don't think that lets you off the hook, Boobies. There's a lot
more Jolly Roger out there and it's all got _your_ name on it!
TOM: Oh well. It was worth a try.
---
CREDITS:
MSTing by Mark Sachs (sl...@netaxs.com).
This MSTing is purely for entertainment purposes and should not be taken as
a personal attack upon Mr. McGucken and company, deserving though they may
be; hopefully someday they'll grow up and maybe even actually create
something worth reading. MST3K characters and situations are copyright Best
Brains, Inc. Finally, this and my other MSTings are archived on my home page:
http://www.netaxs.com/~sleet/content.html#content:mst3k
Written in Shadowramma.
---
> Ahoy! But dost ye not remember Cain was a sinner?!