I’ve got him now, the devil said,

   He’s hungry, thirsty, faint

From fasting forty days and nights,

   Quite broken—he’s no saint.

And just in time to put in play

   My subtlest strategies,

My three-stage plan for dealing with

   Such would-be deities.

Stones turned to bread should satisfy

   The nagging of the flesh.

Stage one alone should do the trick;

   I call it “Oven Fresh.”

If that one fails, from up aloft

   A-tumbling he shall go.

The temple roof supplies the spot;

   I call this “Stub Your Toe.”

But if from that high pinnacle

   He simply won’t be hurled,

I’ll offer him, at modest cost,

   The kingdoms of the world.

I’ll hardly need to use this ploy,

  My favorite of the three.

It’s aptly titled, don’t you think?

   I call it “Worship Me.”

The best-laid plans of demons too,

   However, go awry;

The tempter launched his clever scheme,

   But none of it would fly.

Had Jesus answered in each case

   Just from the Pentateuch,

His mastery of scripture would

   Have been a stern rebuke.

But sharpening the point to bring

   The devil to his knee,

Each swift rejoinder was a text

   From Deuteronomy:

“Man does not live by bread alone;

   The Lord you shall not test;

One only must you fear and serve.”

   The fiend gave way, impressed.

This Jesus really knew his stuff,

   He’d more than learned his part;

The devil saw it, since he too

   Had scripture down by heart.

But what a prig! Someone should teach

   This fellow to see sense!

The least one could expect from God

   Was sovereign negligence!

How dare he bandy words with me,

   And play me for a fool!

What kind of God would stoop to learn

   His lessons in a school?

The devil hated anything

   That might make him look weak.

He’d always been, you may believe,

   A specialist in pique.

He’d live, or die (all one, to him)

   To fight another day.

He threw his hands up in disgust

   And stiffly walked away.