I had a hippopotamus; I kept him in a shed

And fed him upon vitamins and vegetable bread.

I made him my companion on many cheery walks,

And had his portrait done by a celebrity in chalks.



His charming eccentricities were known on every side.

The creature's popularity was wonderfully wide.

He frolicked with the Rector in a dozen friendly tussles,

Who could not but remark on his hippopotamuscles.



If he should be affected by depression or the dumps

By hippopotameasles or hippopotamumps

I never knew a particle of peace 'till it was plain

He was hippopotamasticating properly again.



I had a hippopotamus, I loved him as a friend

But beautiful relationships are bound to end.

Time takes, alas! our joys from us and robs us of our blisses.

My hippopotamus turned out to be a hippopotamissus.



My housekeeper regarded him with jaundice in her eye.

She did not want a colony of hippopotami.

She borrowed a machine gun from her soldier-nephew, Percy

And showed my hippopotamus no hippopotamercy.



My house now lacks the glamour that the charming creature gave.

The garage where I kept him is as silent as a grave.

No longer he displays among the motor-tires and spanners

His hippopotamastery of hippopotamanners.



No longer now he gambols in the orchard in the Spring;

No longer do I lead him through the village on a string;

No longer in the mornings does the neighborhood rejoice

To his hippopotamusically-modulated voice.



I had a hippopotamus, but nothing upon the earth

Is constant in its happiness or lasting in its mirth.

No life that's joyful can be strong enough to smother

My sorrow for what might have been a hippopotamother.



       — Patrick Barrington