A Queen's Poetic Retreat

    

   July 24th 1567, following a year of imprisonment in Loch Leven Castle in Perth and Kinross, Mary Queen of Scots was forced to abdicate. 

    Her time as queen was tumultuous, and she escaped from the reality and skullduggery that surrounded her by writing poetry.

     Today I've included a short sonnet of hers, believed to have been written about the Earl of Bothwell to whom she later married. A marriage that would throw her life into further turmoil.  

    Please enjoy and thanks for visiting my blog today.  

Lord, grant your mercy unto me:

Teach me some way that he may know

My love for him is not an empty show

But purest tenderness an constancy

For does he not, alas, ev'n now possess

This body and this heart which would not flee

Discord, dishonour, nor uncertainty,

Nor family hurt, nor evil's worst distress.

For his sake, I value all my friends as dust

And in my enemies I seek to place my trust,

For him, my concience and good name to chance I've cast;

I would renounce the worls, were it his whim:

I'd gladly die if it should profit him,

What more is there to prove my love steadfast.

Mary Queen of Scots (8 December 1542-8 Feburary 1587)