'Twas Burroughs, and the ILLIACS
  Did JOSS and SYSGEN in the stack;
All ANSI were the acronyms,
  and the Eckert-Mauchly ENIAC.

"Beware the deadly OS, son!
  The Megabyte, the JCL!
Beware the Gigabit, and shun
  The ponderous CODASYL!"

He took his KSR in hand:
  Long time the Armonk foe he sought.
So rested he by the Syntax Tree
  And APL'd in thought.

And as in on-line thought he stood,
  the CODASYL of verbose fame,
Came parsing through the Chomsky wood,
  And COBOL'ed as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
  The final pol at last drew NAK!
He left it dead, and with its head
  He iterated back.

And hast thou downed old Ma Bell?
  Come to my arms, my real-time boy!
Oh, Hollerith day! Array! Array!
  He macroed in his joy.

'Twas Burroughs, and the ILLIACS
  Did JOSS and SYSGEN in the stack;
All ANSI were the acronyms,
  and the Eckert-Mauchly ENIAC.

         -- William J. Wilson