Down the streets of old Portugal where some speak Mirandese,
Or in the towns of Singapore, where tongues wag Cantonese.
In the Northern Island seas where the Danes speak Faroese
And some foreigners, I’ve heard tell, speak Chinese and
Javanese.
Or along the Egyptian delta, where Arabic is king
It’s a worldwide phenomenon, amazing is this thing!
This polyglot world of ours is thoroughly awash
With lots of words, but there’s just one word for squash.
You could walk down the road speaking Uzbek or Manx.
You could say ‘Merci Beaucoup’ or ‘Tack’ or just ‘Thanks.’
It could rain in Sussex, so one puts on galoshes.
Then what can one do? Why, one goes and one squashes!
Scottish Gaellic’s heard along the Firth of Forth.
In Sweden it’s Sami that is spoken up North.
In South Africa its Afrikaans, Xhosa and Zulu,
And Pakistan speaks Pashto, Punjabi and Urdu.
But when these people feel they need a squash game
They all speak the same tongue, it’s all the same name!
In India it’s Bengali, Bhojpuri, and Khasi,
Plus Dogri, Sanskrit, Tamil and Nepali.
Italy has Friulian, Sardinian, Sicilian,
Catalan, Slovene, and, of course, Italian.
But all have just one word when it comes to this sport.
Say it and soon you’ll be on a squash court.
In Malaysia where the great Nicol David does play
They speak both English and a lot of Malay.
The Netherlands speak Dutch, West Frisian and Limburgish
And in Luxembourg – where I played once – there is
Luxembourgish.
And the Russians have so many they’re too numerous to list
But by now, dear readers, I’m sure you get my gist.
If the world were one big squash court, I’m sure there’d be
peace,
Acrimony, misunderstandings, and aggression would cease.
The next time soldiers, their bullets, and bombs are all set
Perhaps a squash player at the UN should yell ‘LET!’
