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The End of the Feud

The revellers came to Castle Krag
And whirled in through the hall,
Into the lavish ballroom with
The Lord of Donegal,
He came with his wife and mistresses,
A merry, laughing crew,
To answer the call by Castle Krag
To end their ancient feud!

For there by the central pillars stood
The Baron, John FitzHugh,
A smile on the ravaged, bitter lips
That his enemies once knew,
He was of a mind to end it all,
The bitterness, the strife,
And even smiled at the courtesan
That he'd asked to make his wife.

She'd laughed, and fluttered her fan at him,
'I don't think so, my lord.
I'd rather share in the favours of
The Lord of Donegal! '
And so she had joined the mistresses
Of his neighbour, and his foe,
The family of O'Donnell with
Their feud of long ago.

So long ago it was lost in time,
The generations passed,
But none of the bitterness had gone,
Some things were meant to last,
The wife of the Second Baron
Had absconded in the night,
With the heir to the Lord of Donegal,
He'd not put up a fight.

The Seventh Baron, John FitzHugh,
Now strolled around the floor,
Intent on greeting guests as he
Had never done before,
'There's wine and ale a-plenty,
We have venison and game,
Let's make it the sort of party that
Goes down in the Hall of Fame! '

The orchestra struck up a tune,
The ladies whirled their fans,
And strutted with their bustles,
Tripped the floor and waved their hands,
Loosened off the stays that held
Confining every breast,
As bodices then fell apart,
Revealing all the rest.

The wine was flowing freely, you
Could see it in their eyes,
These revellers, who'd come to gloat,
The man they'd ostracized,
They laughed and chattered freely
Lurched and fell in revelry,
The Lord of Donegal was drunk,
And sat with Alice Leigh.

The Baron looked at Alice and
She stared him in the eyes,
'Is what you see acceptable, my lord,
Are you surprised? '
She placed the Lord of Donegal's
Right hand upon her breast,
As all the while the Baron stood,
Most pale, and quite distressed.

But out beyond the oaken doors
The masons were at work,
Building a solid wall of stone
That no-one could disturb,
While others filled the windows with
Their mortar and their lime,
And slate of seven inches thick
From Donegal's own mine.

By midnight John FitzHugh had gone,
Was nowhere to be seen,
The revellers were drunk as dogs
And thought to leave the scene,
Whereon the baron, he appeared
On some high balcony,
Within the ballroom's gothic dome
He called to the company.

'I trust you have enjoyed the fare
I've given you this night,
What's left, you'd better make it last,
There's nothing else in sight!
You may as well just party on,
There's nowhere left to go,
The ballroom, your last resting place,
Fit for my ancient foe! '

They rushed the doors, they found the wall,
They tried each window pane,
They looked for any exit but
Their search was quite in vain,
The ballroom was a prison with
No doors, and yet no bars,
They milled around the empty room
And stared up at the stars.

'And now for you, a final treat, '
The baron bellowed down,
'My Lord of Donegal, I hear
You thought to wear the crown,
I have some things to crown you with,
Suspended in this sheet...'
He tugged a cord, it opened up
And billowed at his feet.

The cockroaches that he had bred
In dungeons, dark and warm,
Were loosed from that suspended sheet
And fell there, in a swarm, ,
A million crawling roaches that
Festooned the ladies hair,
Crawled in and out of bodices
To screams of pure despair.

And then the lights went down, and they
Were screaming in their need,
As all those crawling roaches found
New places they could breed,
And Baron John FitzHugh went out
And thought to come back late,
The screams he'd heard were more than
Quite enough, to feed his hate.

* * * * * * *

A week went by, he took an axe
And smashed that masonry,
Remorse had come upon him and
He thought of Alice Leigh,
'If only God has spared her, I'll repent, '
He prayed aloud,
But all was silent in that room,
Each corpse would need a shroud.

And then the slightest movement by
The pillars in the hall,
Had caught his eye, he gave a sigh
And felt that he might fall,
For Alice Leigh was propped upright
And stared and stared at him,
'I love you still, ' he groaned, 'my dear,
Why did you go with him? '

He waited for her answer, she
Had still not made a move,
She stood there in the darkness, like
Some beauty from the Louvre,
But then her lips had parted and
His heart stopped, in despair,
As roaches poured from her eyes and mouth
And crawled all through her hair!

12 January 2010

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