Alchemy For Dummies

Alchemy For Dummies
Lay open on my bench
Displaying yet another formula
Yet another procedure

Turning lead into gold
Isn't as easy as I had thought
I've been spending months on it
And my patience is getting thin

Hundreds of times
I've set things up just so
Applied technique
And had nothing to show

Except nineteen pounds of lead
Which is one pound less than when I started
For one of the times I'd run things through
I'd vaporized a pound of it

Lead's boiling point is 1750 Celsius
I'd like to throw up my hands and say "Who knew?"
But that'd be silly because it's no mystery
What IS a mystery is how I keep mixing Celsius with Farenheit

This time though it will be different
I can feel it in my bones
I've taken some theories of Zosimus
And tweaked a thing or two

I check the temperature of my concoction one last time
Satisfied I grab a one pound ingot with my tongs
Swinging it over the small cauldron
I bump my rack of chemicals

To my horrified widening eyes
Every single one of them fell right in
To join my already bubbling mixture
Causing me to cringe

With no warning after that
My cauldron detonated like a bomb
Covering me with the new mixture
Along with everything else in the small room

So that's where you'll find me
Standing alone in my ruined lab
Still shielding my face with my arms
Frozen in a golden pose

Everything around my golden statue form
Glittering in golden glow
My face still reading the fear of that last moment
A monument to my accidental accomplishment and stupidity

Someone is going to be rich
When they do bother to look for me