A Perfectly Indented Sea
Once, a long long time ago,
There once came to be
A dance of tabs and spaces, ‘cross
A perfectly indented sea.And so it was, and it was good
Two newlines shared the load.
Both tabs and spaces had their place
No buffers overflowed.Then came the troops of K&R
Who set up their convention
To brace the sea at ends of lines
And hopef’lly end the tension.But, alas, ‘twas not to be
‘Twas just beginning yet
For ANSI had monopoly
on standards they could set.“We need to brace each line alone”
They cried passion’t’ly.
“Only then can we en-shore
A perfectly indented C.”“Never!” called their bitter foes
And let fly tabs and spaces
With many a top-row keyboard mash
Flung in each others’ faces.“What is thisss?” said a passing snake
“Thissss conflict makesss no ssenssse!
There’s no need to brasssse at all
If you jussst use indentssss.”But the ever-growing armies there,
They paid the snake no heed
And back and forth, the flamewar grew
For neither would concede.At last they dropped their weary arms
Their arguments all used.
And tried to find some value in
the sea they so abused.For now,
returned to real life.
Their programs dead and gone.
They’d had their chance and blown it all,
The world had just moved on.And if you go out to that sea
One language now is spoken.
Whitespace alone is all that’s left
All other text now broken.
Part of NaNoWriMo Penance. Title donated by Tony P.