The Winter King
You look out on a world now crusted thick
with ice and snow, now that the Winter King
sits on the eastern throne and everything
stops —— caught short, clutched in cold. A con-man's trick
klept him the scepter; social subterfuge
dispatched a knight or two who might have ruled
more justly. Blathering his rude, unschooled
prejudgements —— promising a resort refuge
for the gently taxed well-heeled, he kills
a lady bearing torch in flowing gown ——
perhaps does else, once knife has kissed her down ——
and smiles. To win a test of wills with ills!
Pleased that an ursine purse pulled down this crown
his porcine party wallows in his swills.
(Note that I posted here this poem as "You Look Out on a World," in 2017, thinking it a fair enough draft. I felt the desire, though, to finish it. This month I have done so. Cheers. . . )
