Best Historyfather Poems
Lizzie Borden Took an Axe
By Elton Camp
Family love often will subside
When there’s property to divide
Old Andy Borden’s second wife
Came to be a cause of much strife
He allowed his two daughters no say
When he began to give money away
To his second wife’s Abby’s own kin
With them, his generosity did begin
“For you to do like that is so lame.
On the estate Abby has no claim.”
Anger filled daughters one and two
Only the youngest knew what to do
When on a trip her sister was away,
Her crafty plan Lizzie put into play.
Ugly old Abby was at home alone
Her husband was on business gone
Bridget, the Borden’s Irish maid,
Feeling sick, in her room had laid
“Now’s my chance,” Lizzie thought
Unawares, her stepmother she caught
While she was making up the bed,
Lizzie swung an axe to her head.
Alongside the bed she did sprawl
Making not a cry or a move at all
When home to nap her father came
Then she proceeded to do the same,
Quickly removed her bloody dress
Cleaned from herself any red mess
Police,“Where can Mrs. Borden be?
We very much need her to see.”
Then came a shout, all to astound.
Come up here, look what we found.
Lizzie tried to conceal a happy smile
At the two bloody murders ever so vile
To loss of inheritance she put a stop
When into death her parents did drop
The evidence proved extremely strong
That Lizzie herself had done the wrong
She cried, “Oh jury, you must see me free.
Surely you have to believe it wasn’t me.”
To think any woman might be so evil
In that distant day was too unbelievable
Less than two hours did the jury deliberate
Before making their decision as to her fate
“We find pretty Lizzie did nothing wrong.
So open the jailhouse and send her home.
It would take some libelous and stupid fool
To accuse a young teacher of Sunday school.”
It was obvious that Lizzie had much to gain
If to continue alive Mrs. Abby did not remain
Both motive and opportunity, clearly she had
But a gentle woman could do nothing that bad
But the township’s people were not deceived
The jury’s hasty verdict they never believed
In derision, it only took them a very short time
To compose and then chant a mocking rhyme
“Lizzie Borden took an axe
And gave her mother forty whacks
When she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one.”
Am I considered lucky to be born into the purple?
I am the daughter of an emperor in Constantinople.
Actually, I am a prisoner in anguish and pain.
I am forbidden to marry during my father’s reign.
All in the court hail the Emperor Constantine.
As a father, he has been cruel and mean.
Many have called me the most beautiful of our time.
However, a woman in her late forties is past her prime.
My father has been emperor since Uncle Basil’s death.
He is now quite near to taking his last breath.
As a result, he has placed his seal on an edict.
I am to marry Romanus Argyros, the city’s prefect.
This man Romanus had been married previously.
My father made him divorce in order to marry me.
I have no feelings for Romanus at all.
The man catching my fancy is named Michael.
Romanus can only be an emperor of the worst kind.
A way out of this problem is what I must find.
Empress Zoe of the Byzantine Empire lived from 950 to 1022 AD
Bernardo O’Higgins Riquelme
was born in Chillan in central Chile.
The bastard son of Ambrosio, Marquis de Orsorno,
his Irish-born father hailed from County Sligo.
Bernardo’s mother was Isabel Riquelme.
She was from a prominent South American family.
Bernardo was supported financially
after the father became a Peruvian viceroy.
Bernardo was sent to London while a young boy
where he was able to acquire a formal education.
He soon learned to despise Spanish domination.
Bernardo sought to fight for independence from Spain.
His homeland should not be a colonial domain.
He would share the same ideas as Francisco de Miranda.
This man hailed from the north in Venezuela.
Both men espoused the prospective idea
of a free and independent South America.
O’Higgins joined the Logia Lautaro in 1810.
He was helped by Argentine Jose de San Martin.
In 1814, the rebels suffered a costly defeat.
Into the Andes Mountains, the rebels had to retreat.
This loss came at the Chilean city of Rancagua
It started the period known as the “Reconquista”
In 1817, the rebels won a great victory.
The Battle of Chacabuco ended Spanish sovereignty.
Chile and Argentina were both declared independent.
Bernardo O’Higgins became Chile’s first president.
Thanks to wikipedia.org online encyclopedia for pertinent information I obtained to
write this presentation.
Grandma Curcio
You look out at me
From a yellow, cracked photograph
Even my mother
Doesn't remember your first name
She cannot be faulted
You were dead
Long before she married your son
Who were you, really?
Are you hidden in
The hard lines etched
In your grim, granite, grandma face?
Did those eyes pierce the soul
Of your alcoholic husband
And cause him to bleed?
Is that why he terrorized
You and your children?
I can only know you
Through my father's few words
"She was a wonderful, sweet woman"
I can only know you
Through his actions as a teenager
When he beat his father - perhaps as badly
As grandpa had beaten you all:
"If you ever touch Ma again, I'll kill you"
My father did not have to
Carry out his threat
Grandma Curcio
You lived on
In the man my father became
And now that he is gone
You live on in me
Who will gaze upon
My yellow cracked photograph?
Will they know my name
And wonder who I was?
And who will they be?