Beware of the Greek Alphabet

Cherry

By luigi_pagano

Sun, 28 Nov 2021
  • 1521 reads
14 comments
 

It isn't of the Greeks
you have to be aware
but of their alphabet.
Certain letters scare
some people a lot
whereas many others
do not give a jot

(A noun that we know
is derived from iota
which is the letter
that's ninth in the rota
of the Hellenic syllabary
used a great deal
to define the mutations
of the Covid pandemic.)

We had Alpha and Beta
then Gamma and Delta.
it seemed that a vaccine
could be our shelter
from the infectious disease
but the the variants go on.
Once again feel unease
knowing that Omicron
has arrived on the scene.

Don't know what happened
to Eta, Zeta or Epsilon;
and I'd like to know why
they missed Mu, Nu or Xi.
If the virus is too advanced
we hope that immunity
will be greatly enhanced
by a vaccine booster.
The upshot could be mega
should the variations
ever reach Omega.

 
© Luigi Pagano 2021 

Certificate U
Poem
Mutevoli pensieri

Comments

Submitted by Di_Hard on

enjoyed your poem Luigi. I wondered about mu nu and xi. Do you think they were worried about conspiracy people linking xi with China's president? And thought it would look too obvious if they only missed out xi, so left out all three?

 

Submitted by luigi_pagano on

Seeing the ambivalence of the world's politicians towards China (condemning their politics and yet wanting to trade with them), it wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't a ''diplomatic' gesture to avoid offending their leader.
Pleased that you like this latest effort of mine, Di, and thank you for letting me know.

Luigi x

 

 

Submitted by Insertponceyfre... on

Yes! That's exactly why they missed out Xi - I don't know why the others though - you might be right Di. nice play on words in this Luigi - well done

 

Submitted by luigi_pagano on

Hi  Claudine, I must confess that the connection to the Chinese leader never occurred to me but now that you and Di have mentioned it, I can see it's perfectly feasible.

My grateful thanks, as ever, for the cherries and for taking the time for reading and commenting on my 'wordplay'.smiley

Luigi x

 

Submitted by airyfairy on

I'd wondered why they went straight to Omicron as well - never thought about the Chinese connection! I thought it might be because Omicron sounds more ominous - like the villain in a superhero film. 

Thank you for posting this, Luigi - it's got us all thinking!

Submitted by luigi_pagano on

I thought long and hard but couldn't find a reasonable explanation.

 

Submitted by Di_Hard on

I think it is from the Transformers series Airy, my son was bonkers about them :0) Watched the cartoons over and over

and over

and over

sorry to hijack your thought provoking poem Luigi

Although, Mu did sound like it might be a name, to me, and when I looked this up, it is - it means 'admired' in Chinese and is popular for both girls and boys. So it would have been aweful if you are called Mu to have a variant also called that, particularly if a child?  Also, Nu is a popular girl's name in Vietnam? I just wonder why on earth, given that they must have known there would be lots of variants, that they didn't think of all this at the beginning and use a different alphabet!!!

 

Submitted by airyfairy on

You're right! I knew it conjured up memories! My son was bonkers about Transformers too, only it's a bit further away for me! Wasn't Omicron one of the nice Decepticons though? A good guy amongst the bad? 

Obviously, whoever's naming variants hasn't done their Children's TV homework. 

Submitted by Di_Hard on

yes, he was! you have a very good memory, I could not remember which side he was (ashamed) although will spend the rest of the day with the theme tune in my head :0)

 

Submitted by luigi_pagano on

You and Jane have the advance over me, Di. Never had transformers in my household. laugh

Luigi x

 

Submitted by Tom Brown on

There aren't enough letters in our alfabet for mathematics and science so we resort to the Greek alfabet as well and each letter is a work of art. Beautiful. I know all those letters and names also wondered about Epsilon it's right after Delta.

Have good weekend Luigi! Almost there. Tom

 

Submitted by luigi_pagano on

Nice to hear from you, Tom. I guessed that with your mathematical background you would be familiar with those characters. which are all Greek to me and many others I suspect. laugh

Cheers and have a good weekend yourself.

 

Submitted by Tom Brown on

Clever

 

Submitted by luigi_pagano on

yes