ADIEUX À MARIE STUART

I imagine her, Mary,

when they come for her

at the sunrise

in the Spring.

En ma fin

est mon commencement.

Dark circles of fatigue

around her eyes,

unslept since

Fotheringhay.

Dressed in embroidered satin,

Catholic black

and white lawn veil,

betrothed to God and death,

she paces out the Rosary,

unattended

to the block,

save for her lapdog,

a Skye terrier

hiding beneath her skirts,

a fierce storm of loyalty

hot at her ankle.

Before a noble audience of men

two executioners

roughly strip her:

“Now truly, my lords, I never

had two such grooms wait on me before!”

And then the pale throat

and décolleté laid bare, aflush:

blood-red petticoat,

blood-red sleeves,

red for the blood of the martyrs,

defiant to the end.

Pale Elizabeth watches

from a high window,

her white silks, chaste and virginal

buttoned up to the tall ruff.

She withdraws

for the dolorous blow:

deniable culpability.

"In manus tuas, Domine,

commendo spiritum meum"

Whether the axe wasn’t sharp

or the executioner’s hand

unsteady,

the second blow

finished it.

He holds the head high.

The tight

auburn curls tumble

into the pool of blood – a wig!

Vain to the end.

They could not make

her little dog leave her.

Everything is burned.

There will be no relics.

Elizabeth feigned fury

as the bonfires leapt in London.

Grief-mad Scottish nobles

made suicidal charges on the border

(not that her beloved son,

for whom all this was for

showed any sign of caring,

preferring the hunt).

In Paris the priests chant requiems

in Notre Dame, and Henri,

cursing, refuses to see

Elizabeth’s ambassador.

In Spain mad Philip

from Escorial shadows

calls for his generals

and galleons.