An Ode to Plurals

We'll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,
Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.
If the plural of man is always called men,
Why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?
If I speak of my foot and show you my feet,
And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?
If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth,
Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called beeth?
Then one may be that, and three would be those,
Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,
And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.
We speak of a brother and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
Then the masculine pronouns are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine: she, shis and shim!
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Let's face it - English is a crazy language. There is no egg in eggplantnor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. Englishmuffins weren't invented in England. We take English for granted, but ifwe explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxingrings are square, and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it apig.And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don'tgroce and hammers don't ham? Doesn't it seem crazy that you can makeamends but not one amend. If you have a bunch of odds and ends and getrid of all but one of them, what do you call it?If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught? If a vegetarian eatsvegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? Sometimes I think all thefolks who grew up speaking English should be committed to an asylum forthe verbally insane.In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital?We ship by truck but send cargo by ship. We have noses that run and feetthat smell. We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway. And how can aslim chance and a fat chance be thesame, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which yourhouse can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form byfilling it out, and in which an alarm goes off by going on.And, in closing, if Father is Pop, how come Mother's not Mop?