"On The Writing of Historic Plays"

"On the Writing of Historic Plays”

Shakespeare moans about having to write another play for Queen Elizabeth I.

A light through yonder window breaks,

Nay, 'tis not Juliet, but the Sun,

Alerting me to another day

That I must riseth to the task

Bestowed on me by Royal Command.

Queen Beth desires heroic deeds

And histories writ of  Kings of yore,

Her kith and kins' embellished acts

Of bloody wars and battles won.

I do tire of these wretched tales

That needs me study times gone by.

'Tis dry this stuff of politics,

Of greed, of power and deceit.

I much prefer me subjects mad

Or driven to such crazed estate,

Of tacticians, sly and cold,

Who play and joust with power and fate.

Hamlet, Lear and the Scottish King,

Each with minds gone scrambled

As eggs upon a skillet,

Who carry with them to black depths,

Lovers, mothers and some their brothers.

Ah, but when me wakes in happy mood,

Inclined to fancies and to dreams,

I make a Puck in woods imagined

Or Sonnets filled with love and passion,

To feed ‘pon my divine distraction.

Finis

"Oy" - A poem about the origins of the Australian accent.

"Transport Ship" by artist Hugh Gittus

How did we, from a land so proper,
End up Down Under speaking Ocker?
It happened thus, as I shall tell,
That Blighty’s jails were overfull,
And Britons who had gone astray,
Were sent instead to Botany Bay.

Transported over ocean blue,
The five vowels – ‘A,E,I,O’ and ‘U’,
Flung about by wind and storm,
Held hands in terror and took new form.
As one they shouted “Oy, Oy, Oy,
Get us off this bloody, bouncing toy”.

Nor was it wise on tumbling ashore
To open the mouth as wide as before.
With heat, dust and flies abounding
'Twas healthier to be flat sounding
Than bare the teeth and thus let in
Any number of nasty, flying things.

The shrill squawk of a Cockatoo
Is nought compared to an Ocker Blue.
Deep vibrations of the throat are
Bypassed for much harsher notes.

This came about from need,
When no one was near enough to heed.
Before telephones were the order,
"Cooee" carried voices further,
From the sinus it emanates
So high that eardrums can deflate.

Though it’s manly to sound low
In Oz it’s not the way to go.
With voices more like crack of whip
Good grammar also gets the slip.
The sound of cricket bat and ball
Does this country more enthrall
Than principles of diction
That are likely to cause friction.

But don’t be high and mighty mate,
For while on you my voice might grate,
One thing I must make clear -
It’s better than anywhere else down here.

by Kim Dessaix