Albert Camus And His Existential Emu Poem by David Alexander Jackson

Albert Camus
Kept an Emu
Tied to a potted,
Portable wisteria
To keep him company
Whilst he kept goal
For the University of Algeria.

As Albert was fishing
The ball out
From the back of the net
The Emu mused
On the conversations they'd had
About The Oprah Winfrey Show,
The significance of suffragettes,
Adam Smith's Wealth Of Nations
And the sexual orientation
Of Sir Galahad.

Whilst discussing the plots of
The Plague and The Outsider
Warm feelings would suddenly
Well up inside her.

Why should such intellect
Elicit so much love
And even more pain?
My thoughts for this man
Aren't getting any vaguer.

Then Utrecht University
Scored again.

There are no happy endings
With Albert Camus -
Decades later he dies
In his publisher's Facel Vega.

When she heard of Albert's demise
Her initial reaction
Was hysteria
And it comes as no surprise
That a few weeks later
She died of diphtheria

Which is so much easier to do
When you're an existential emu.