As it were…

‘Twas the night before release date and all through the house,
not a program was working, not even a browse.
The programmers hung by their cubes in despair,
with hopes that a miracle soon would be there.
The users were nestled all snug in their beds,
while visions of working code danced in their heads.
When out in the lobby there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my desk to see what was the matter.
And what to my wondering eyes did appear,
But Super Programmer with pizza and root beer.
His resume glowed with experience so rare,
he turned out great code with a bit pusher’s flair.
More rapid than eagles, his programmes they came,
and he whistled and shouted and called them by name.
On Menu, On Report, On Procedures And Delete,
On Monitor, On Batch jobs, On Dialogues complete.
His eyes were glazed over, fingers nimble and lean,
from weekends and nights spent in front of a screen.
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
soon made it clear we had nothing to dread.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work
turning specs into code; then he turned with a jerk;
And laying his finger on the <enter> key
the software came up and worked perfectly.
The menus they menued, the deletes they deleted,
the reports they reported, and the batch jobs completed.
He tested each whistle, and tested each bell,
with nary a stack dump, and all had gone well.
The software was finished, the tests were concluded
Our users’ last minute requests were included.
Then the users exclaimed with a snarl and a taunt,
IT’S JUST WHAT WE ASKED FOR BUT NOT WHAT WE WANT!
—anonymous