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In the Soup - A Votive For Saint Subsidy Once upon a group The leader or leaders Decided their charges Would be better off With a newly Concocted soup And so they took From their dues (Taxes) And then conspired To figure out How to make The ‘new and (obviously) improved’ That was sometimes delicious And the group so enjoyed Sometimes it was sour And wasted those misspent dues But even if the soup was good It cost too much to make So to keep everyone happy The leaders kept claiming more dues From the group And lavished same On the soup-makers And called it subsidy It dimly dawned On the every-day members That they were consumer pawns Paying the extra freight Once in the stores 1
2 And quietly twice from their dues The new soup was an instant Hit An entitlement Whose true cost was ignored The bargain was no bargain But blithely the spooning party Seemed destined to go on Pretty soon they began To venerate this entitlement By canonizing - Saint Subsidy And they created special votives (Lobbyists) To plead for and ensure that Continued blessing would Be bestowed by Saint Subsidy As this revered patron gained great popularity The soup was made in ever and ever Larger and larger batches By fewer and fewer select members (Mainly friends and families of the leaders) Pocketing as profit – The subsidy Forbid that they would Forgo the handout And make ends meet Only from the sales of the soup Just as we scoured out the bowl The last tasty tidbit Sopped up with bits of bread So they kept scouring the group (Us)? The blessing of Saint Subsidy In full measure - Became untouchable Vive Votive! ==================================AG 2010
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