Curiouser and curiouser... When we found a Fred Bremmer (one of the names to which the original “Waka Waka Bang Splat” poem was attributed) on the Internet, and wrote to ask if we could publish his poem here, he sent us this version:

< > ! * ' ' #
^ @ ` $ $ -
! * ' $ _
% * < > # 4
& ) . . /
| { ~ ~  SYSTEM HALTED

Translation of this version:

    <  >  !   *  '  '  #
     Waka waka bang splat tick tick hash,

    ^ @   `    $   $  -
     Caret at back-tick dollar dollar dash,

    !  *  '  $    _
     Bang splat tick dollar under-score,

    %   *   <  >   #   4
     Percent splat waka waka number four,

     &      )    .  .  /
     Ampersand right-paren dot dot slash,

     |       {     ~  ~   SYSTEM HALTED
     Vertical-bar curly-bracket tilde tilde CRASH.

It seems there are dozens of copies of the poem out there. It eventually got posted to rec.humor.funny on Usenet, where it got into the archives and then got printed in Infocus magazine, and meanwhile it has been forwarded all over the place by friendly emailers, chain mail-style. An audio version has even been posted among the Wireless Essays of Richard Howland-Bolton (you can listen by rolling your cursor over the poem text on this page).

Our copy came via Victor Infante in Worchester, Massachusetts, from Roger Descheneaux in Austin, Texas, who says “I haven’t written any poetry since college... I’m just some online guy who forwards mail.” But we say, Roger, that makes you a poet with all the rest of us! After all, This is the Net, Toots, where if you read it, you wrote it! And we’re all writing this Web... We invite replies, in symbols only....

reprinted with permission from:

Fred Bremmer
7-3-161 Dogohimata
Matsuyama, Ehime 790 JAPAN

fredb@cc.matsuyama-u.ac.jp
Finger for PGP key. Encrypted mail preferred.

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