The English Queen

Vanguard July 2012 p. 8

To satisfy the craving for a focus on the lovely lady we reprint excerpts of Henry Lawson’s The English Queen.  The fact that this was written as a birthday ode to Queen Victoria is neither here nor there: we are with Shelley in dismissing them all as “dregs of their dull race” (England in 1819).

The English Queen - A Birthday Ode

(by Henry Lawson, 1892)

There's an ordinary woman whom the English call "the Queen":
They keep her in a palace and they worship her, I ween;
She's served as one to whom is owed a nation's gratitude;
(May angels keep the sainted sire of her angelic brood!)
The people must be blind, I think, or else they're very green,
To keep that dull old woman whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen", —
That ordinary woman whom the English call "the Queen".

The Queen has reigned for fifty years, for fifty years and five
And scarcely done a kindly turn to anyone alive;
It can be said, and it is said, and it is said in scorn,
That the poor are starved the same as on the day when she was born.
Yet she is praised and worshipped more than God has ever been —
That ordinary woman whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen", —
That cold and selfish woman whom the English call "the Queen".

The Queen has lived for seventy years, for seventy years and three;
And few have lived a flatter life, more useless life than she;
She never said a clever thing or wrote a clever line,
She never did a noble deed, in coming times to shine;
And yet we read, and still we read, in every magazine,
The praises of that woman whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen", —
That dull and brainless woman whom the English call "the Queen".

They say that she is "Gracious", and that she's inspired with love,
They also say that she's inspired with wisdom from above.
They say that she's a noble Queen, and can do nothing wrong,
They call on God to bless her, and they hope she'll reign for long;
And where her foot has never trod, her heart has never been,
There's many a statue raised to her whom English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen", —
That ordinary woman whom the English call "the Queen".

The Prince of Wales is worshipped next (it is a funny thing)
For he will be the loafer whom the fools will call "the King".
They keep the children of "the Queen", and they are not a few;
The children of "the Queen" and all her children's children too.
The little great-grandchild is great because the nation's green
And Grandmama's the person whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen",
Whom the English call "the Queen", —
The dull, yet gilded dummy whom the English call "the Queen".