Historical Poetry Quotes

“The Physician's Pageant by Stewart Stafford

Can aught endure the masquerade
Of this world's blindfolded night?
Melancholy's strike doth calm the raving,
As babes roused from stillbirth in fledgling light.
We know that the womb doth wander,
Around the body, causing ills without care,
A pessary's charm doth anchor it in place again,
As bait doth lure the quarry to the snare.
Burn sulfur, rosemary, lavender and juniper,
Or foul dung smoke to cleanse tainted rural air.
Light aromatic torches in the playhouse and market,
Let vile odours and miasmas in these spaces beware.
Though ragged contagion and death still doth assail,
God willing, some blessed souls still shalt prevail.

© 2024, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved. ”
― Stewart Stafford

“Stuck In One's Craw by Stewart Stafford

Nobody's beeswax,' still, you nosily ask:
'Is it the last supper to eat that fast?'
Try blackened potato skin's bitter taste,
A heritage of hunger's grim, gaunt waste.

From Celtic mist, this heir apparent,
My grandparent's grandparent(s),
Survived Ireland's holocaust famine,
As a local catch, not New World salmon.

Crop blight drove their starving plea,
With lots cast bleak to die or flee
Genetic appetite fed the strongest,
Those who eat fastest live longest.

© 2025, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”
― Stewart Stafford

“Corsican Checkmate by Stewart Stafford

With one loyal warhorse,
I could snatch victory!
You force an ultimatum,
An eagle downed for wrens.

Are you battle steeds,
Or brood mares of a new stallion?
Or do you take my knight,
In impotent checkmate?

I, Napoleon, ruled Europe,
From Brest to Brest-Litovsk,
A chicken feather’s stroke,
And my empire falls.

You offer exile to Elba,
Reaping rich estates
Which I secured for you,
Silence is my thanks.

Give me your vile scrap,
No death warrant, but close,
I’ll scratch my mighty name,
Here’s my blood — begone!
This about the abdication of Napoleon Bonaparte.

© 2025, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.”
― Stewart Stafford

“Ireland

The land is scarred
by hills and roads of foreign.
Ways lead to false capitals
and answered calls of long-ago wars.”
― Laura Chouette, The Willow Song