May’s beauty is at end

but this is not the end of the year’s story

for as she wraps the string of pearls given

to her by Jupiter’s wife

in recognition for accepting what Tiresias could never

in either guise deliver, Junius’ further accession

to the pride of womanhood is to name herself

Queen of the northern isle again.

 

Her sister in the South is restless and blows hard

to turn the world on its axis, the diametric twins

of Junius and December

at odds with each behind

the veiled curtain of life, pleasant in the eyes

of the public left they realise the populace discover

their naked ambitions for their hearts and minds.

 

Junius sees the oncoming middle age

that will see the nights of old return once more

and the death of certainties of youth,

the creak in her knees as she piously kneels

to her Gods is painful

but lest the  allusion of immortality fade from scavenging eyes

for the world may turn

but Junius is not ready

to go out with abandoned hope

just yet.

 

Middle age spread

over her reign of thirty days

in a world that doesn’t look at her in the same

way as those with love in their hearts

glimpse to the May Queen or to the Goddess of war to come;

Junius has no suitor to speak of,

the only talk from those in prosperous villages

below her sanctum is of the returning Dark Knights

rumoured to be just over the horizon

and the pain that they can inflict with a single stroke

of their sword, Junius, feeling too old

for such excitement and the challenge

that the Dark Knights return will bring to her realm,

smiles with grace and places summer at the height

of her agenda,

to stave off the Dark Knights return with heat

ready for her sister’s war like attitude and August’s

feeling of tranquillity.

 

The feast is ordered, Sol will turn

but not in the way the Dark Knights expect,

the division bell from the nearest church bells

will ring out in splendour and the lines of Junius’

face will be obscured by the mask of solitude.

 

The Dark Knights will not be feared by her subjects,

at least not till long after her reign,

for whilst those who still look to Queen May with love

and the memory of the blossom that now lays

in the gutter, June’s suitors are non-existent,

she will not let them down though, she will

keep the shiver of the bleak to come

at bay.

 

She will not be remembered for her anger,

nor her outstanding beauty,

not for want of trying will Junius be lauded,

but she will be selfless,

she will use the Solstice in her favour

and have people think fondly of her.

 

Ian D. Hall 2015