Marie Antoinette

Marie Antoinette

 

Marie Antoinette lost her head

When she mocked the poor who had no bread.

To further compound her mistake,

She said that they should just eat cake!

So blind to their fearsome plight was she

Who ate cake all day completely free.

 

But, if you think her fate unjust,

Or think on her with pity,

First I ask you to look around,

At the people in her starving cities;

At the poor and homeless,

Who, in freezing cold,

Drop like flies before they’re old.

With no safe place to lay their head

Except under the gravestone when their dead.

 

Though I too once looked with pity

On this princess and her starving city,

She could have seen as plain as day

That, to avoid sorrow and dismay,

For the price of a single ring or jewel

She could have fed all those to whom she’d been so cruel.

 

But then I realised her suggestion was skilful,

Though founded on ignorance,

Systematic and wilful:

She’d deliberately chosen not to see

The reality of strife,

And how her enormous wealth

Could affect a poor man’s life.

 

And so in truth it might be said,

“Be glad the rich young bitch is dead”

But though I do feel a bit this way,

It’s really only ‘sorta’…

After all, I cannot help but see

She still was someone’s daughter!

But although she may be very dead

And really quite long gone

There are all too many ‘marionettes’

Just like her, left to carry on.

 

by

 

David L Rowlands