Pretty Good

By:  Charles Osgood

There once was a pretty good student,
           Who sat in a pretty good class
And was taught by a pretty good teacher,
           Who always let pretty good pass.
He wasn't terrific at reading,
           He wasn't a whiz-bang at math;
But for him education was leading
           Straight down a pretty good path.
He didn't find school too exciting,
           But he wanted to do pretty well,
And he did have some trouble with writing
           And nobody taught him to spell.
When doing arithmetic problems
           Pretty good was regarded as fine.
Five plus five needn't always add up to be ten,
           A pretty good answer was nine.
The pretty good class that he sat in
           Was part of a pretty good school,
And the student was not an exception,
           On the contrary, he was the rule.
The pretty good school that he went to
            Was in a pretty good town.
And nobody seemed to notice
            He could not tell a verb from a noun.
The pretty good student in fact was
            Part of a pretty good mob.
And the first time he knew what he lacked was
            When he looked for a pretty good job.
It was then, when he sought a position,
            He discovered that life could be tough,
And he soon had a sneaky suspicion
            Pretty good might not be good enough.
The pretty good town in our story
            Was part of a pretty good state,
Which had pretty good aspirations,
             And prayed for a pretty good fate.
There once was a pretty good nation,
             Pretty proud of the greatness it had,
Which learned much too late
             If you want to be great,
Pretty good is, in fact, pretty bad.