Jack (not his real name, presumably)
and Jill (ditto)
went up a so-called hill—
though hill is rather generous;
more knoll, one gathers,
or incline at best,
and even that remains disputed
in the literature.
They went, we are told,
to fetch—
or procure, if we are being precise—
ostensibly,
a pail of water.
One pauses here.
A pail.
Of water.
From a hill.
One does not wish to be indelicate,
but water, as a rule,
collects at the bottom of things.
This is not controversial.
The Greeks knew this.
And yet we are asked to accept
that two persons of uncertain identity
ascended an elevation
of dubious classification
to retrieve a substance
that, by every known principle of hydrology,
would have been more readily available
at the base.
Jack allegedly fell down
(fell? or was pushed?
the account is silent)
and broke his crown.
What manner of crown?
Surely Jack was not royalty.
If he was,
why is he fetching his own water?
One keeps servants
for precisely this purpose.
If it was a physical injury Jack suffered—
which is contestable,
the sole witness being Jill,
whose credentials have never been established—
then crown must refer to the head.
But the phrasing is instructive.
One does not break a head.
One fractures a skull.
One suffers a contusion.
The language is evasive.
Deliberately so,
one suspects.
And what of the pail?
No one ever asks about the pail.
It is not mentioned in the aftermath.
It is not recovered.
It is not inventoried.
The entire affair
has the hallmarks
of a contrivance.
I prefer to think Jack and Jill (Gill), were good-minded spirits, or portions thereof, by their measure, rather than an ill-fated family from Kilmerson, Somerset.
But then blast King Charles I for scaling down the double noggin (Jack).
#poemsabout #falsecrowns #poem #poetry #prose #verse #rhyme
