The DNA Protest Song
by Jeffrey B. Moran

Let me tell you a story ‘bout a man named Felix on a tragic, fateful day.
He put thymine in a beaker, guanine in a flask, and went to make some DNA.

Chorus: But did he ever rufflup? No, he never rufflupped
With his phosphates so abrupt.
He may hide forever in the labs of Boston,
He’s the man who never rufflupped.


Felix picked up more thymine at the Woods Hole Laboratory which he traded for some cytosine.
But the P.I. told him, “One more nucleotide!” Felix couldn’t finish his gene.

Felix said, “I don’t understand what’s missing. Is it purines or pyrimidines?”
All the P.I. said was “You must be making some amine deficient proteins.”

Chorus:


Felix’s wife goes down to the lab every couple of days.
And through an open window she hands him a test tube full of polymerase.

So Felix tried doing some PCR, but he didn’t get very far.
An explosion occurred near the Bunsen burner; he ended up doing CPR.

Chorus:


Now all night long Felix wanders the lab crying, “What will become of me?
How can I ever win an (Ig)Nobel Prize or even earn a Ph. D?”

Now come all you people, don’t you think it’s a shame what happened to Felix?
For the lack of adenine and some hydrogen bonds, he couldn’t make a double helix!

Chorus: