LEST THE TAPESTRY FADE

Posted by Admin on 31 March 2008, 12:00 am

We loved him ere his shoulders
bore the weight of kingship:
admired how he rode in point-to-point,
fell, and rode again:
envied the panache with which,
beturbaned as a Bengal Lancer or
pink-coated for the Melton Mobray Hunt,
he carried picturesque attire.
With interest, too, we watched him meet
the people of all nations – saw the Empire
take him to its heart. Nor did his deep
concern for those in need at home
pass unremarked by men who should
themselves have cared.
And so when memory, asleep full six and
forty years, recalls a girl-thrown
rosebud retrieved and worn, we see
the Man whose apologia (more moving
than the Monarch’s abdication) touched
our loyalty, nor left it weakened
by that touch.
And now that he to Frogmore has been
brought to lie beside the royal dead,
we should forthwith record potential
that might well have led to doughty deeds
reserved for those who live to dare –
such men as he, in any age, are rare.