A BALLAD OF QUEEN ELIZABETH by MARGARET WIDDEMER

Queen Elizabeth sat on her threshold
Before she had quite grown old,
The gown she wore was of scarlet satin
And her coif was of silk and gold:

The Lord of Leicester knelt at her shoulder
And a lute-child played by her knee --
It was one of those hours that are never forgotten,
And nothing to hear or see;

Lord Leicester talked of a day they remembered
When they were little together,
Of young Queen Jane and a robe she wore,
And the old King's chain and feather:

The child with the lute leaned close to the Queen
And laid his head on her knee
To hear their stories of once-on-a-time
When they were little as he,

And the Queen put a hand on Lord Leicester's shoulder
And a hand on the lute-child's head . . .
Yet there was little she seemed to hear
Of the things they sang and said. . . .

And the trumpets blew from under the window,
Calling the Queen to rise,
And her face turned back to a Queen's again
And her eyes turned hard and wise,

And she said, "I think I hear England calling,
That I wedded while I was fair,
And England is calling, that is my child":
And she went and left them there.

But Leicester was only a man after all,
And the boy was a man-child too,
So the thing she was feigning before she left them
I think they never knew.

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

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