For Royna Whitby

I wonder if your children rise at night And haunt the shadows with your name I wonder if memory would take flight Were you now as then the cuddled same How did you come to me the first time What did we say to start the flame Our romance fell apart in its sweet prime But O I love you then, just the same Not deep enough to fast for food or sleep Not strong enough to yield a diamond tear Not angry enough to find a cliff and leap You were special, but not to me most dear So what then this feeling I cannot shake Since your sudden death to me was told No guilt could make me as stars keep wake For that which was nobody's gold Yet, my dear, you were always something Much better than the best of us, a gem We did not know the value of, no king Was finish in rule ... no rose without a stem You were the silent part that value brought To longing, weary, harried hearts The butterfly in death's destroying net caught The light that pious prism distorts Farewell, Royna, I pray your quest for happiness Will make us meet again ... beyond this vale Of callousness ... in brighter verdant plain. Rest In your little while ... God's meries never fail.