by Barbara Lydecker Crane
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| DAME Maggie Smith strides across a cemetery in this sneak peek from the fourth series of Downton Abbey. --Express, 2 March 2013 |
Enraptured, I would follow you each Sunday night
ever since your wary entry at the Abbey
as reluctant heir. I gauged your first, wide-eyed sight
of gorgeous Lady Mary–unpredictable and crabby,
she’d treat you badly–but you, steadfast, were charmed.
I swooned for you and sweated bullets as you fought
in French trenches. Oh, that blast that badly harmed
your spine! Feeling paralyzed like you, I thought
that you and Mary might at last be through, until
you walked again and while I wept, you won her hand.
Your baby boy’s arrival brought both pang and thrill.
Overjoyed, you…crashed and died! I understand
the reason is you have another acting gig?
Matthew Crawley, you are nothing but a pig!
Barbara Lydecker Crane is the author of Zero Gravitas (White Violet Press, 2012) and the children's collection Alphabetricks (Daffydowndilly Books, forthcomingin 2013). In 2011 she won the Helen Schaible InternationalSonnet Contest.