Castle Cross Stitch

High in the top of a medieval castle,
there lived a seamstress named Guinevere Gleam.
Magic was she with her thread and her needle;
button-hole savvy and royal inseam.

She had a bolt of fine fabric from Egypt,
rich rolls of silk from the Tang Dynasty.
She put a sign on the keep of the castle:
“If you are threadbare then come and see me.”

Frayed were the King’s sleeves when he dined one evening;
mutton fat clung to the fabric he wore.
He sought out Guinevere ere royal matters:
“Knit me some new sleeves, O thee I implore!”

Guinevere bowed and she said, “O your highness,
thou art the king and thou hath many charms.”
She grabbed her cloth tape and said to Sir Henry:
“Before I start I must measure your arms.”

Soon it was known through the whole of the country,
how expertly Guinevere Gleam could sew.
She got so famous the serfs had a saying:
“Gleam in the eye of a needle, you know!”

A close-by kingdom then heard of her magic,
how by her hand she could make garb appear.
So they decided to launch an invasion,
to carry off the seamstress Guinevere.

Word of invasion became known to Henry;
thus with his council he sought a defense.
Someone suggested something quite outlandish,
but in the end Henry thought is made sense.

He went to Guinevere with the proposal;
she grabbed onto it with animate cries.
On silk cloth she embossed fiery dragons,
using red thread to make ire-like eyes.

Then dragon-cloth was draped over the castle;
enemy armies came marching apace.
But when they saw all the fiery dragons,
they ran like panic all over the place.

Folk’s celebrated throughout Henry’s kingdom;
a royal feast went off without a hitch.
There was consensus from all loyal subjects:
Guinevere Gleam had a way with a stitch.



40 Lines
Writer’s Cramp
January 21, 2014