Namings
Cambridge

In ancient days
the town of Ugg was filled
by what would now be rudely called
Neanderthals and peasants,
and occasional flounced academics.

But the rich boys and the clever boys
resented the rough and common culture,
They caused a language strike–out
against the sounded names;
the hills of Gog Magog
became the ‘Local Ridge’.

But ‘Local’ was too wuss.
A horizontal jogging entrepreneur,
who gifted screaming services
loud and hidden on the hills
to gentlemen with cash,
was Madame “Catherine Anna Maud Belge”.
She was known, in spoken code
when wives were nosy near,
by a “Camb” name.

Up grew the town
around the flouncing schools,
whose name became,
from those wildly–rumour hills,
Camb Ridge.
But when that times’
unhumoured censorship collapsed,
those earthen lumps
reverted back ‘The Gog Magog’.

So now the town was only named
for gifted screaming services.
An academic city
named for a horizontal pro?
A king with cash to budget
sensitive to scandal?
Something must be done.
But luck had struck;
the river could be named again,
the town could claim
a story good for getting grants,
pseudo–history’s “Cambridge”.