JUL 10, singable satire: "DOWNSIDE, NOW", a revised take on "Both Sides Now"

PARODY LYRICS 

MUSICAL UNDERPINNINGS: "Both Sides Now" is a ballad by Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. Included in her album "Clouds" in 1969, it became one of her best-known hits. The song had been released as a single two years earlier, and was also recorded by Judy Collins, then Celine Dion and many others.

PARODY COMPOSED: Giorgio Coniglio, September 2024. Performed at the Ukes of York ukulele jam, October 2025.

UKULELE and GUITAR-FRIENDLY LINK: Our whole series of songs can be found in a friendly format for ukulele (and guitar)-players on our sister blog "SILLY SONGS and SATIRE" with chord-charts for both the parody and original song, as well as helpful performing suggestions. Find ukulele and guitar chord-charts to help you accompany "DOWNSIDE NOW" on your favorite instrument, click HERE.

 DOWNSIDE, NOW

(to the tune of "Both Sides Now" by Joni Mitchell)

Moles and voles arrange their lairs -- they cope with heat-waves, as do hares, 
And suffer summer's sultry air, in tunnels where they stay.
But now their favorite food's in doubt -- the worms in berms just won't come out
(Worms stay down deep, avoiding drought, so moles can't eat their prey).

Moles checked out soil from up and down,
They're moving north, and leaving town;
It's soil's hydration that they sense.
(I note all this in moles' defence)

Whales and seals and swarms of eels: aquatic creatures -- none conceals
In lakes and seas, how lost they feel, our weekly poll reveals.
They're now upset about their seas (defiled by plastic vortices)
So, near the shore, they ask you please, "Don't toss your trash away."

Our time on Earth, like theirs, is thin:
An oceanic garbage bin
Sums up the dreadful state we're in.
Our leaders are like "clowns sent in".

Flocks of auks and human fools reject the science learned in schools.
To fix the sitch we lack the tools, no cooling's underway.
So, blame the universities -- they study eco-travesties,
And halt research with funding freeze, denial games to play.

Like moles, we have vestigial eyes -- 
Our autocratic gang denies
(And lies with self-delusion strange),
Earth's deadly outlook -- climate change. 

(Editors' Note: Additional information is available for readers in our illustrated poems about "drought", the "great auk", (an extinct bird species), "global warming", and "too hot to hoot").

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