The world is made up two sorts of people – the gifted versifiers, and the rhythmically and metrically challenged. Much as I would like to have been otherwise, I most definitely fall into the latter. I do, however, know a most talented comic poet, who also happens to be one of the brightest young IP lawyers in town.
Shefali Sewak, who graduated from Lady Shri Ram College, and the Faculty of Law, New Delhi, has practised as an IP attorney at the Delhi High Court and the Trademarks Registry for the past five years. She recently decided to take a mid-career break, and has joined the LL.M in IP programme at the Franklin Pierce Law Centre.
While acclimatising her tropical sensibilities to a wintry autumn in New Hampshire, she also found time to compose the absolutely delightful verse below, which I hope you will all enjoy, just as I did. This piece will touch a chord especially with those trademark folks who have had to live in the shadow of those higher mortals, the patent practitioners of this world.
I must point out that Shefali, in addition to having won some well-fought injunction matters, has a treasure trove of comic verse up her sleeve, which she shares with people but rarely. I certainly hope she publishes a compilation of her poetry some day soon!
(The photo, in case you’re wondering, is that of Ogden Nash, whose literary heritage, I am pleased to inform you, remains very much alive).
by Shefali Sewak
O, Soft IP! O, Soft IP! How palpably disparaged are thee.
It mocks with insufferable slurs, that patent bourgeoisie.
I object to Hard IP’s insolent ‘softening’ of my worthy profession,
And protest with staid gravity to its’ self-declared accession.
For what is feeble and puny, I ask without compunction,
About getting millions in damages with an extravagant trademark injunction?
And if I claimed as mine, words that were in fact Chisum’s,
Which patent, I wonder, would cease my bootlegging and plagiarism?
No amount of specifying claims, or for that matter, claiming specifications,
I fear would accomplish much in preserving a geographical indication.
So unless a patent can prevent Indian cider being labelled as ‘champagne’,
From the veneration of patents, I think the world could safely refrain.
Bill Gates, I speculate, at ‘Hard’ IP, has likely scoffed.
For when it came time to christen his brainchild, don’t you know, he went with Microsoft?
So if you’re not dabbling in patents, don’t worry, your trade isn’t ‘soft’.
There’s a new term for what you’re doing. It’s called ‘IP Aloft’.*
*Note: I don’t hold a patent on ‘IP Aloft’. I do, however, hold the copyright. Ha!
