Ose Is Dark

          Ose Is Dark

               (to the (minor-key!) tune of “Space Is Dark”)

                              Chorus:

Ose is dark, and ose is deep

So in vain we struggled not to sleep

Though we filkers are insane

We all dosed off just the same

And our drooping eyelids testify

To the yawns that we stifled to a sigh…

When we came in to filk that night, we were a fannish crew.

We had our songs and instruments, and of course a keg of brew.

We got our books and guitars out, and sat down in a ring

And tortured half a hundred tunes to see if we could sing.

But over our festivities a shadow fell and spread;

Our voices quavered half a tone, our strings were flat and dead

Then from our song leader, this mournful wail arose;

“Why is it, every single song we’ve sung tonight is ose?”

               (Chorus.)

A song is ose primarily when it has a certain tone;

A kind of whine, a mournful dirge, a dreary keening drone;

Its lyrics may be sprightly and as witty as can be

But it’s bound to sound depressing when it’s in a minor key.

When we pulled into Argo Port in need of R&R

Our crew set out investigating every joint and bar

We had high expectations of their hospitality

But we found too late that it wasn’t geared for spacers such as we.

               (Chorus.)

We struggled hard to lighten up, but the ose was far too strong

It drowned out all our instruments, so we had to sing along

It drained our beer, it scraped our tapes, it busted every string

And it gave us broken ballads full of misery to sing.

Now every single filker here is nodding off to sleep

We try to stay awake but we’re entangled far too deep

We can’t repel the spell of one of filking’s fiercest foes

So one by one we all succumb to the power of the Ose!

               (Chorus.)

We see our buddies yawn, then nod, then fall down to the floor

Our casualties are piling high, as if this were a war

We lay each fallen comrade out to snore upon a chair

Then we bravely go on singing, though we haven’t got a prayer.

Against the mighty Ose we fading few cannot compete;

The Ose is now triumphant; we are doomed to grim defeat.

Our final conscious action is to turn of all the light

Then we tumble into slumber as we bid ourselves good-night.

               (Chorus.)