I think that I shall never see
A math book that agrees with me.
The problems just go on and on,
And it’s not that I generally get them wrong,
It’s the way they’re written, don’t you see?
Instead of writing {-(-6)-[5+(-2)]} they could just write’3.’
You don’t come across problems like that in life,
So why do I have to go through all this extra strife?
Math used to be easy, it used to be fun.
30 times 5, plus 2, minus 1.
But now every problem has issues galore,
Though none that I haven’t encountered before.
It’s just that each problem’s so long and so messy,
Even the ones that go: ax+bc.
Because a=3, and x=7,
c=40, and b is 11.
Now copy your problem out, multiply, add,
Be very careful, or at least don’t get mad.
The only good thing about this I can see,
Though checkbooks will vary in mighty degree,
And taxes are painful, and seldom are free,
They’re none of them worse than these math books for me!