Lady Jane Grey

There was no trial, no grand debate,
Just a crime I had no part in orchestrating
I’m just a girl, will this be my fate?
A token for others to fight with and break

My life is not mine, my prospects are mined
And trafficked to fit in a man’s grand design
For power, a delicate flower am I
Trampled and tarnished and sentenced to die

“Jane The Quene” I agreed to sign on some letters
On instruction of guardians who should have known better
Than to use me as wager and pawns in their games
Now the ink on those letters is proof of the blame

I should hold and should have alongside my name
My Lady, My Daughter, My Queen or My Jane
A wife to a husband who’s blood soaks through straw
By order of a Queen who’s allegiance I swore

I would swear if ever was given the power
Instead now I darken and dwell in this tower
No dances, no music, no perfume, no flowers
Just the loom of a crown high above me that glowers

And signals the end of a life cut too short
For accepting a title that I never sought
That I never wanted and I never chose
But I bowed to the pressure given by those

Meant to protect me and love me and keep me
From harm, but now those protectors they seek me
To throw me infront of the neck-cutter’s blade
Call me “Usurper” so their lives are saved

A future forbade, a family slayed
A legacy cut down and squandered for trade
Loyalties played and oaths now betrayed
My life in exchange for a treaty just paid

For what, for fame? For pride in a name?
The cycle repeats but the price stays the same
100 crowns for the neck of a Queen
100 crowns for the life and the dreams

And the future and acts and the love yet unseen
Never to dance or to draw or to sing
Never to creak or to grow old and creep
To the arms of my God who’s glory I seek

And whose voice does not speak though the hours grow bleak
And my conscience grows weak, I was loyal and meek
And a servant, a fervent disciple was I
Kind and obliging and early to die

I had no power, I had no stakes
Why does trusting and faith and naivety make
Me a villain, barely a woman and yet
Doomed as a symbol of whims and the sins

Of others, blessed in the years that they’ll get
While I’m frozen in time and my body is wetting
The ground, Lord herald the sound of the man
Paid to revoke me my time on this land

Pray he takes my hand and places me well
I’ll close my eyes so I cannot tell
Where to lay my neck on the headman’s stage
Pray is aim is sure and swift is the blade

Pray the Lord will deliver me into His grace
Pray my sister’s remember my voice and my face
Pray for days of my life that are stolen away
And pray for the soul of the Lady Jane Grey