New Zealand’s unreal poet laureate composes an Ode for the author of a stupid column about sausage rolls
My Queendom for a Roll
The Queendom was in disrepair;
I rode through darken’d fields night long,
until I ventured on a lonely inn,
and stabled up my faithful steed.
Into the dim interior I strode,
And rapp’d my knuckle on the counter:
Young snipe, I queried,
wherefore art thou sausage rolls?
The churlish flunkey gaped anon.
His ape-like brow did rise in wonder.
Sausage rolls, I didst repeat,
such savoury aroma I desire;
S-A-U-S-A-G-E-R-O-L-L-S
my dear simple fellow!
The knave just shrugged;
his damn’d countenance insolent!
I mounted up upon the table,
scattering the peasant’s mugs of ale:
and in my wounded passion
did address with fervent clarity
the rough, unmanner’d mob.
Thus our Queendom sinks
to sloth and turpitude;
when the banner of rank
means nothing to rebels and villains.
A sausage roll, a sausage roll,
my Queendom for a roll!
Sirs, in my age, slipper’d and pantaloon’d,
I entertain no longer
the hot desires of fragrant youth;
neither the thrusting ambition
of the virile man of the world,
seeking power and renown to seize.
But this lack wounds my gentle dignity!
The 24/7 service industry is lost;
these minions do not care
for the wage of half a groat per year
to heat my sausage roll.
Victor Billot has previously been moved to write Odes for such New Zealand luminaries as Christopher Luxon, Jacinda Ardern, Brian Tamaki, Willis and Rawnsley, Dr Siouxsie Wiles, Duncan Garner, and Garrick Tremain.
