Great Writing - Home > Poetry > Queens of England
READING ROOM
Great Writing - Home
Read and review others' work
Articles on writing
Advice from the community
COMMUNITY
Talk to others in the forums
Events and Competitions
GW News
ABOUT GREAT WRITING
All About Us
Contact Us
WORK AWAITING REVIEW
GW IS...
Great Writing creative writing community is designed to prompt ideas and provide inspiration and motivation within aspiring and amateur authors. Whatever your topic; from love poetry to Doctor Who or Harry Potter fan fiction, Great Writing's online writing group is where you can make new friends and improve your creative writing.
WHO'S ONLINE
We have 1246 guests online and 1 member online
Poetry
Queens of England
By Fledermaus
02 August 2007
England has a history of iron ladies it seems...

Green island in the North Sea
Boasts of masculinity
Redcoats conquered every land
For Britain all nations bent
Yet although built on warfare
There's a strange thing to declare
For of all its mighty kings
All those of whom the bard sings
The greatest weren't men at all
The queens' statues still stand tall
Boudicca, warrior queen
Empress Maud as can be seen
Cruel Mary, the bloody one
Elizabeth, the pale swan
And the mightiest of all
The world listened to her call
Victoria, the empress
In her pitch black widow's dress
Mightier than Gengiz Kahn
She sure is the greatest one

Reviews
Queens ...
Written by patterjack (1175 comments posted) 2nd August 2007
... for a moment i feared a homophobic vilification !  
 
Not one of your best , I 'm afraid -- I find the rhythm and rhyme well out of true  
 
patterjack

Written by Phil (6681 comments posted) 2nd August 2007
I too thought you were going to write about Elton et al. 
 
You missed that modern day queen of witchery - Mrs T.  
 
Interesting piece. Boudica just about saw the Romans off. Possibly a good thing she didn't. 
 
Phil.

Written by Fledermaus (3246 comments posted) 2nd August 2007
Interesting, how certain people hijacked the word, but then, they did the same with the word 'gay' itself... 
Nope, this is about your monarchs. 
Patterjack: You're right. It staggers here and there, and I did cheat with the rhyme. Perhaps I'll rewrite it once. 
Phil: Indeed. I thought of putting her in. After all, no matter one's political views, she is remarkable. I think she would fit in the list perfectly... Powerful woman, a bit scary and crushing her opponents in war.

Written by fellpony (1600 comments posted) 3rd August 2007
what a shame you didn't think to mention our present occupant of the throne; after all, she has been there for 55 years. 
 
But to the writing: hm, a bit rough and bumpy as has been mentioned. First two lines very nice though!

Written by philkent (157 comments posted) 3rd August 2007
I think the UK does well under women leaders because woman are good at reigning in the worst excesses of testosterone and let things like pragmatism inform there decisions more than pride or the dread male ego. 
 
A blanket generalisation I know but I think there's a truth to it. 
 
However 
 
Alfred The Great 
Wellington 
Winston Churchill 
Robert the Bruce 
 
All pretty handy as war leaders. 
 
I liked the poem by the way, sort of thing I can imagine having read at school in some Edwardian text book.

Written by Fledermaus (3246 comments posted) 6th August 2007
Thanks Sue and Philkent. 
I think that if I would include modern examples, Margret Thatcher would be more suitable than Elizabeth II. After all, I somehow see Elizabeth as a cute granny rather than an iron lady. 
And yes, Britain has its male leaders, but it struck me how many iron ladies there were.

   Only registered users can rate and write comments.
   Please login or register.

Powered by AkoComment 2.0!

 Previous item   Next item