Listing to Port

6402 Songs

-6402.1 Those sung by individual people

   –6400.11 Songs sung by individual people whose names and faces are well-known

      –-6400.111 Those that are sung by Rick Astley

   –6400.12 Songs sung by people who are just hanging around

      –-6400.121 Those songs that stay with you in unsearchable, evolving fragments

      –-6400.122 Those that express an emotion more perfectly than speech

      –-6400.123 Songs heard from a passing car

   –6400.13 Songs that are so perfectly a fragment of their time that they evoke an overwhelming nostalgia

   –6400.14 Songs recieved as charming declarations of love that, when examined more closely, turn out to be about stalking

-6402.2 Those sung by many people at once

   -6400.21 Those that knit together stories from harmony

   -6400.22 Those that have moments that are like orgasms or death or something, that stack notes together into gaps in time and all you can remember is that maybe you were floating

   -6400.23 Those that wash you up instead onto a quiet and breathless shore

   -6400.24 Those that are enjoyably prepostorous

-6402.3 Those sung by animals or insects

   –6400.31 Songs by bats, for bats, or that can only be heard by bats

   –6400.32 Songs by elephants and whales

      –-6400.321 Those about the beauty of grey and the virtues of being slow

   –6400.33 Those sung by bees, to you, that you did not listen to, and the bee was a bit pissed off but too polite to make a fuss

-6400.4 Those of a more geological nature

   -6400.41 Those whose words are footfalls and whose epic verses end in earthquakes

-6400.5 Those of a more astrophysical nature

-6400.6 Of unknown or mystical origin

   –6400.61 Those songs that are always at the edge of hearing as you walk the path through the woods, the ones that you could hear so much better if you left the path and ate the fruit and possibly pledged your soul to the goblin king

   -6400.62 Those songs that are always at the edge of hearing in any case, edging out of background noise when you are especially tired like faces in clouds

   -6400.63 Those that are cursed to stay in your head forever

   -6400.64 Those that will never give you up

1. I once knew a bear - let me tell you her story
This bear was all grizzly and grumpy and growly and gory
She busied her bear days with scrumping and prey
And bearing about in a bear sort of way.
At dawn the bear got up for breakfast, all yawning,
Ate squirrels on sticks (which she kept for snacks in the morning)
And picked at her teeth with a suitable bone
And went to the woods for some bear time alone.

She beared right to the site of her favourite tree  
Where she found fifteen tourists, all shouting with glee:

There’s a bear! Where’s a bear? Over there! See that hair?
That’s a bear. Hello bear! (take a photo of its lair!)
Poke the bear, if you dare! Bear? Bear! Bear? Bear? Bear! Bear! Bear! There’s a bear!
And the bear rolled her eyes with a look of mild surprise
And beared back home again.

2. Oh well, thought the bear in a bear sort of way,
It seems that these woods are engaged for this part of the day.
There are other locations a bear can attend
To the needs that a bear has around the rear end.
Why, just up over the mountain (or so it is claimed)      
Lies the thickest of prickly forests with thickets untamed
All greeny and grim and with thorns overgrown
So I’ll go to that forest for bear time alone.

She found there a woodland as wild as was famed.
So had thirty-three hikers, who loudly exclaimed:

There’s a bear! Where’s a bear? Over there! See that hair?
That’s a bear. Hello bear! (take a photo of its lair!)
Poke the bear, if you dare! Bear? Bear! Bear? Bear? Bear! Bear! Bear! There’s a bear!
And the bear did a growl and a grumpy sort of scowl
And beared back home again.

3. Oh well, thought the bear in a state of some tension:
Wherever needs must a bear is a fount of invention.
I have here a passport, a hat and a beard
Which I’ve sheared from a hiker (now feared disappeared).
The bear repaired to an airport the following day
Where she furtively boarded a plane in a bear sort of way.
This bear through the air flew to pastures unknown
Save for suitable jungles for bear time alone.

I know about jungles - for bear time they’re better
Except for this bear, ‘cause that’s where I met her.
You wouldn’t believe all the photos I got!
There was quite a commotion, believe it or not.
Being trapped in a tree for a number of days
Makes one empathize with the bears and their ways.
I promised (with hope of avoiding a slaying)
I’d pass on in song to those thinking of saying:

There’s a bear! Where’s a bear? Over there! See that hair?
That’s a bear. Hello bear! (take a photo of its lair!)
Poke the bear, if you dare! Bear? Bear! Bear? Bear? Bear! Bear! Bear! There’s a bear!
That I think I’d advise that such actions are not wise:
You should go back home again!