Penultimate/Ultimatepen
He said they couldn’t fence him for he liked to roam free.
No sty could ever hold him. No captive pig was he.
That he was a wild pig was true without a doubt.
As soon as they would pen him in, in seconds he’d break out.
But the farmer, too, was resolute. As his prize pig departed,
he vowed that he’d contain him. He wouldn’t be outsmarted.
He built a sturdy metal fence, and then he strung it higher—
woven fine and tight of the premium barbed wire.
Then he caught Porky and closed him in, determined that he’d win,
for it wasn’t up to any pig to refuse his fencing-in.
But indeed the pig devised again a means by which he left,
leaving the farmer feeling defeated and bereft.
Once more caught and then re-penned and taking his repast,
the pig had not a clue that this meal would be his last.
This escape his penultimate, now the die was cast.
His days of glorious freedom, alas, were in the past.
Then, his last meal finished, he made his next advance
toward a fence reconstructed, ready to take his chance.
But, alas, he’d met his match. Escape would never be,
for the farmer had infused the fence with electricity.
This time not the penultimate, it was the ultimate pen,
for Porky has been seen, I fear, just one more time since then.
Spread out on a platter, an apple in his jaws,
his final feat a foolish one, bound to give one pause.
When he said they couldn’t pen him in, I fear poor Porky lied,
for when he hit the fence this time, in minutes, he was fried.
Ham that he was, I fear that poor Porky’s lot was cast.
For the pen after the penultimate turned out to be his last.
Probably not the first time a pig who was a sinner
paid the price for it by turning into Easter dinner.
