The hackers of the Elder Days
   cultivated mastery:
   the subtle essence,
   deep, penetrating, profound, hairy.

And so we cannot understand them.

As a best effort, therefore,
  I wil describe their appearance:

They were cautious as the elephant,
  like one making global changes to a codebase.

They were vigilant as the monkey,
  yes, like a rogue(6) player fearing danger from all quarters.

They were courteous,
  like ITS turists.

They were egoless, yes,
  like ice which is just about to crack.

They were solid, yes, like GNU utilities.

They were open, yes, like a newly formatted disk.

They were opaque, like spaghetti code.

Who can make spaghetti code straightforward?
  It gradually clarifies itself.

Who can make dead code useful again?
  It gradually rejuvenates itself.

Holding to the Unix Way,
  one doesn't long
  for more and more features.

Truly, therefore, one is compact,
  and can remain stable
  without gratuitous changes.

[Credit: sbp suggested some improvements]