I’ve often talked about the Gee menagerie in this column: our two cats, four chickens, hamster, snake, two guinea pigs, and Beelzebun, Demon Bunny of DOOM.

But I have ignored several more.

Five hundred more, in fact. To be specific, the five hundred brandling worms that came with our wormery, which have in true darwinian fashion been slowly recycling food scraps, mouldy bread and back copies of the Eastern Daily Press and, I hope, producing useful fertilizer to give next summer’s tomatoes a bit of a kick.

It’s time that our worms’ contribution to our lives is recognized, so I have attempted a suitable paean, with apologies to an Eminent Victorian.

Half a loaf, half a loaf,
Half a loaf onward
All through the Bucket of Decay
Squirmed the five hundred
“Forward the brandling worms!”
“Ingest the potato skins!” he said
All through the Bucket of Decay
Squirmed the five hundred.

“Forward the brandling worms!”
Was there a worm dismay’d?
Not tho’ the brandling knew
Someone had chundered
Their’s not to make reply
Their’s not to reason why
Their’s but to recycle, aye!
All through the Bucket of Decay
Squirmed the five hundred.

Compost to right of them,
Compost to left of them,
Compost in front of them
Decay’d all asunder;
Storm’d at with grot and smell,
Boldly they squirmed and well,
Stuff’t refuse with their every breath,
Into their mouths so well
Squirmed the five hundred.

Flash’d all their setae bare,
Flash’d as they spurned the air,
Scything the bacteria there,
Charging the fungi, while
All the world wonder’d:
Plunged in the bacon-smoke
Right thro’ the refuse broke;
Woodlouse and earwig both
Reel’d from the sliming stroke
Shatter’d and sunder’d.
Then they squirmed back, but aye,
All the five hundred.

Compost to right of them,
Compost to left of them,
Compost behind them
Decay’d all asunder;
Storm’d at with grot and smell,
While refuse and detritus tell,
They that had crunched so well
All process’d thro’ their jaws of Death
Refractionated all so well,
All that was left of it,
By the five hundred.

When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made,
Honor the brandling worms,
The noble five hundred.