MAGPIE TALES
supplied the illustration
SAD SONNET
We speed along the highway known as life,
We're all agleam with chrome and steel and leather.
The wind along the way cuts like a knife
But we're inside protected from the weather.
The music blocks out all the painful thoughts;
The scenery beguiles us as we're travelling.
We have no reason to feel out of sorts;
We do not guess that life itself's unravelling.
Rejoicing in our youth and health we go;
The wheels spin underneath us, reassuring;
Light-hearted jokes spill from our radio;
The essence of ourselves seems so enduring!
Then come the grinding brakes, the creeping rust.
All lovely journeys end......because they must.
*
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THE UNTOLD STORY
'The Crown Discarded for Love', or so the headlines said!
A future King, immersed in power and glory,
Giving up his throne for the one passion of his life!
It seemed, back then, to be a great Love Story!
I was a very small child, but a hazy recollection
Of drama, gossip, shock and adult woe,
Still lingers in my mind, as 'something awful going on',
A snapshot of those days so long ago.
Yet I have since found out that there was so much more
That ordinary people never knew.
The page of history turned and the archives have revealed
That the Great Romance was only partly true.
The Prince admired the Nazis, he thought Hitler was just great,
The Government was shocked and horrified.
To think he could be Monarch when the coming War arrived!
It was vital, then, that he should stand aside!
Behind closed doors in secrecy, they longed for Abdication,
In many ways they brought it into being,
While the British Public gossiped about sex and great romance,
It wasn't the true picture they were seeing.
*
