I composed the following poem for the Duke Gyrth Oldcastle Memorial Smackdown at the 2012 Kingdom Arts and Sciences Festival. (Really, I composed it at KASF. I showed up with three ideas, a thesaurus, and a rhyme dictionary, and finished the last poem one minute before the smackdown began.) That year, we each adopted a historic persona (mine was Margaret Beaufort, mother of King Henry VII) and wrote from her perspective.
Everyone who entered the contest needed to write one poem with two words that rhymed with "Gyrth" in it; this is mine.
Blessed Woman
Am I, as woman, but a vessel now?
An empty clod of earth, for man to plough?
My use but spent upon the hour of birth,
Discarded like a chrysalis, without worth?
Though rip from me my newborn infant son
And force my wedding to another man
And raise my Henry far beyond my reach --
I will his new-fledged grand ambition teach.
For God has promised me this thing:
If I shall bear the son, he shall be king.