Grant Me The Carving Of My Name

[poliphilo]

I caught the replay of Richard's interment. Like everything else in the sequence of ritual it was more or less note perfect. I particularly approved the opening hymn- words by GK. Chesterton, music by Anon as arranged by Vaughan Williams: they couldn't have chosen better.

O God of earth and altar
Bow down and hear our cry
Our earthly rulers falter
Our people drift and die...

Talking about appropriate words,there was a poem written for the occasion by Carol Ann Duffy. I haven't been much of a fan of her work- but this was magic. They had Benedict Cumberbatch read it. He turns out to be distantly related to the Plantagenets- though   by now I suspect everyone in England is-  apart, of course, from the current royals.

There's been a lot of media hostility to what Leicester has laid on.The Mail sneers, the Guardian blusters. It baffles me. All I can think  of while breasting the foam is, "Have they no poetry in their souls?"

Comments

[nineweaving.livejournal.com]

That poem is beautiful.

They should bury kings in the provinces more often.

Nine

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

There are other possibilities. I read yesterday that a team of archaeologists is planning to dig up a playing field in Faversham in the hope of finding King Stephen.

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

Faversham Abbey was his foundation of course and Davington Priory Queen Matilda's.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I'm very fond of Faversham. Wouldn't it be fabulous if the abbey were still standing!

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't it just.

There's a memorial in what is now the parish church, St Mary,which is though to be connected with Stephen.