Description: Chaucer is sometimes creditied with the romance of Valentine's Day when he wrote about King Richard II marriage on May 2, a day that commemorates a Bishop Valentines death in Genoa. This day was confused with the Catholic feast day that commemorates the martyr(s) St Valentine on February 14. This day is believed to be set to divert the pagan attention of the Romans who celebrated Lupercalia, a Greco-Roman festival for fertility.
*The Name Valentine comes from the latin that means Worthy.
Oh Geoffrey!
Did you ken what confusions you’d cause?
A few simple lines to commemorate a royal wedding
On the feast day of a Genoan saint.
You and your raunchy humor
And bawdy thoughts
Of birds mating
What a way to speak of the Royals!
The joining of countries
Reduced to a tumble!
And now, Geoff!
People are mistaking your “customs”
Crediting them to similar Romans
Pagan in thoughts and deeds
Naked in the streets
Delivering pregnancy rites
Those Corinthians would be mortified by our cupids
Babies in Diapers, Indeed!
What a colossal mistake
Equating the day with the gods.
How could You!
Those poor Worthy* martyrs
Consecrated by the Church
Their feast day now celebrated
With sweets, chocolate and edible underwear.
Your tales have carried
Until commercialism reigns
And Saints day resembles a pagan marriage
Dressed in blood-red and pink.
Oh Geoffrey! If you’d only known!
You'd be laughing.
hehe this is nice, i don't think I've ever seen edible underwear mentioned in a poem that wasn't a total disaster of a poem. nice job, and i didn't know that valentine came from Latin for worthy, nice learning poem
Vynom
PS thanks for the comment on No meaning anymore
Oh, I really loved this. It was so delightful. I also didn't know about the speaking of Chaucer at that wedding. I too learned something new today. For some reason, when reading it, I kept picturing Chaucer as portrayed in the movie A Knight's Tale. And really, it made it that much better to me. I would maybe have changed this line:
This is delightful! It is humorous, and tells an entertaining story! It's ok that the holiday celebration got a little confused; us guys are always looking for any excuse to celebrate and woo you lovely ladies!!
I reqally enjoyed how this was a historical story and "correction" but in prose! I didn't know all of this so I also learned something new today! How true the last stanza!
Submission Name: Chaucer's Folly
