The priest kicks back with a Scotch

 

That was some day.
My first suicide,
and I did her father just last month
commit to rest.

I thought I put up a good show,
would not submit to hotheads
who know not the Godless funerals
we prefer.

A messenger beseeched me
all the way to Claudius,
the girl had gone and drowned herself
while swinging on the willow
with but one hand,
and while strictly speaking
she should lie in
the farmer's field,
my Liege recalled
some whisper in the ministry
to post me off to Lapland,
whereupon we two lightning fast congrued:
a minimal observance
or what his majesty
declared some maiméd rite.
So 'a bore her bare-faced on the bier,
when in reaching my great climax
(thence to hie me home for whisky),
who should part the bushes?
"It is I, Hamlet the Dane!"
'Twas quite some sight!

He took my one small patch of Danish land,
to bait the deluged brother,
to pelt noble Laertes with wet sand,
up he'd come from the beach
to steal the show already stol'n,
fighting in the grave indeed,
what is't that young men these days read?
There was such sweet arrayment of
virgin crants and maiden strewments
all trod down, ground into dust,
because the dog Dane had to have his day,
shame on you all,
I'll have a top up all the way
and drink to how
I do not want to be.

So now, mad Prince, permit this eructation, if you will:

Top of the playbill:

"It is I, Erik of København!"

While lighter thoughts do dark ones soon replace,
I'll keep a fresh smock close by just in case.

 

 

—Daniel Roy Connelly (from his collection of Hamlet poems, Rime Out of Joint)

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