The True and Tragicall Historie of King Boris

Scene: an antechamber of King Boris’s castle. Strewn around the throne are copies of daily newspapers, many with red tops. They are mingled with more dubious periodicals, decorated with crude etchings of ladies wearing little, or no, clothing. King Boris is slumped in what could be described as a tragic attitude, head leant upon hand in the manner of Rodin’s The Thinker. Queen Carrie is peering into a glass ball, commanding it in imperious tones: “Hey, Crystal…”, but pushes it aside with a troubled air, to contemplate her paramour.

Queen Carrie

Sire, leave alone those red topped rags,

The Daily This and Daily That, The Sun and Torygraph,

These tawdry papers that ne’er raise a laugh,

And come back to thy beloved bawdy mags-

For on thy brow I see the signs of stress and strain

And I really wish to see thee smile again!

Yes! To thy former tastes return- see, here

Are your Roman Wives, Vestal Virgins Dear…

[She hands him some copies of magazines which today would be described as adult, and pushes aside her crystal ball]

For my part, better ‘tis this sport I leave,

For in this ball see I much cause of grief,

As before me rise in never ending line,

So many ladies, mainly fair (though to me swine),

It seems of thee that all have had their share,

And most it seems, brought forth thine heir!

Toward me now they march, babes in their arms,

All waving paternity suits- no! No more alarms!

And all I did was peer into the glassy ball

And classily call “Hey Crystal, tell me now

Or show, the sisters who’ve heard my Boris’s vow…”

First the ball did buffer, then did it crash-

Was my question quite so foolish, quite so rash?

King Boris

My dearest- hah, remind me, what’s your name?

Ladies, after a while they’re all the same…

Despite thy loving care and tender thoughts for me,

Of my woes there’s so much thou canst not see!

A womb thou hast, and hence are not so able

As me- in horsy metaphor, thou’rt from another stable…

And then of course to Eton went thou not

But at some lesser school thy learning got…

Where Latin and Greek are rarely taught

And knowledge’s simply not of the right sort…

Queen Carrie

That’s what you think, oh foolish Bojo!

But thee I’ve watched as though in slow mo…

The downward drift of thy still youthful reign

As thou blunderest again and again…

Tell me, and tell me true, which of thy crimes

It is that strikes along with midnight chimes

To make thee grunt and sweat and shiver,

As though Cupid had ta’en from his quiver

Love’s poisonous dart, and thy podgy self shot,

To make thee feel so warm; nay, even hot?

Is it thy doomed closing down of Parliament?

An act I guessed thou’d come to repent;

Or the lies thou toldst the Queen- Liz, I mean, not I,

For ne’er thy fibs I hear without a knowing sigh-

Or was’t thy texts emblazoned on a bus,

Which e’en to me seemed truthless, libellous;

Or thy brush with death, when saved thou wert by those

Whose very right to work thy didst oppose,

Being not in this fair isle of England born,

And therefore much deserving of thy scorn?

Come, my King, tell me now, what is’t?

See I cannot, what possibly could be worse-

Unless perhaps the quality of this verse?

(Unless ‘tis the wailings of thy new born boy

That thee distract from lonely bachelor joy?

Though as a scarcely first time father I’d have thought

Thee by now familiar with perils of this sort…)

King Boris

Since that day when first crowned as England’s King

This dreadful Chinese plague’s the worsest thing!

The old beast from the east has been and gone,

But this new viral version’s far far worse-

Before ‘twas merely meterological,

But now ‘tis epidemiological!

Worse of all, Lord Dom, he I thought my faithful friend,

It seems has been pursuing his own end,

A tragic fall poor Boris ne’er foresaw

When friendly Janus brought him to my door….

Queen Carrie

When first of Dirty Dom I heard thou speak,

Another kind of Domme I thought thou meantst

The kind who with canes would give the kind of beating

So oft well beloved of boys from Eton

But now methinks my surmise really true,

Since well with words as whips doth he rule you!

And you my sweet are sovereign but in name-

For ‘tis Lord Cummings alone wins this game…

King Boris

Such fond recall have I of that poet’s soul-

His “Get Brexit done”, and “Take Back Control”,

Were worth translating into Latin or Greek-

And how like sweet wine ‘twas to hear him speak!

I was drunk on Dom’s words…and better still,

Was “Stay at Home”- oh, what poetic thrill!

Again, three words, but three…[Boris pauses, dreamily]

But what those three little words meant to me!

But alas, they meant naught! He had not stayed at home, but fled!

Whilst I by foreign nurses tended, lay ill, in bed!

Oh Dom, was following thine own law so hard

That thou must flee to Castle Barnard??

And now I have a Kingly choice to make-

Does Dom die, or does he live- for my sake

I must decide- but hard ‘tis to let go

A hand that’s held mine so long- Dom, yes or no?

[Exeunt omnes]