Magic Dragon plc

For the director of music. 12-bar blues.

I’m sure you know already, for you must have heard the tale,
of a certain Magic Dragon and his coat of shining scales;
how little Jackie Paper came to play with him no more.
But Puff would soon recover once he found a brand-new roar.
Now he’s traded on the Stock Exchange, a limited company,
and he’s listed on the Board as Magic Dragon plc.

A dragon’s nothing more than just a big, cold-blooded creature
that sits on all your money — if you take it back, he’ll eat yer.
There are dragons in America, and dragons in Japan,
and one came back to Honalee to haunt that fabled land.
From all the damsels in distress came a cry of misery:
‘Who will save our souls from Magic Dragon plc?’

Little Jackie Paper heard the cry from far away.
He’d gone to university to be a CPA:
he’d learnt the ways of dragons, mythological and real,
and all the ways to track them by the kind of gold they steal.
‘Won’t you step into my parlour, Jack? — you’re welcome as can be —
just for old times’ sake, and chat with Magic Dragon plc?’

But Jackie had a mission: he had damsels to defend!
He put on all his armour, and he faced his lifelong friend.
He asked him for no quarter, and he gave no mercy back;
he thought he’d be the victor with his antitrust attack.
They never even found the bones of poor old Jackie P.,
but Puff is famous round the world as Magic Dragon plc!

Selah.

(Written January 1991)