─Burgess Sir Kingswich─
Burgess Sir Kingswich [years reigned: 1933-1943] was a satisfactory, beneficent ruler— was a nomadic, exploring, kind-of poking ruler with “boo-boos” still, and bug bites having honeycomb-colored peaks where scratched skin was stripped for youthful rashness, and his reign was good. His reign was good to the masses and to the bluebirds!, no less, and never did he tire in his royal doings. It’s in his coming-of-age honor that his story is told. I say, long live the Kingswich!, and so bless his sovereignty…
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So Bless His Littleness, serving fixture it was to lone childhood thrown of tree house… From this cinched bark was overseen Burgess Sir Kingswich’s young kingdom of landscape suburbia and his, its sprawl was verily. It was old English suburbia nonetheless, so of much was there scarcer than poshness, but still— what carried through nighttime there was cicada, and this itself was too much the shameful stamp of commonness for his dignity. All low-down normalcy of circumstance was overlooked though, as he wasn’t yet tall enough to learn real estate or provide for its purchase either, and Burgess Sir Kingswich had exhibited boldness enough in the renaming of his own self [circa 1935]. The boy lived in an antique bloom of bookshelf somewhere over England; he wrung out its countryside quarters for nobleness rightly. Its passages shrouded his filled mind when school time duty came calling, and all advances to faculty not made in story tale merit were duly done away with, per the Kingswich’s orders…
Burgess Sir [as was the abbreviated name sent out for sup] boasted every winning specialness in the way of his features— yes, the big, bristled eye bats; yes, even the mismatched lip shapes spluttering of youth. They were ignoble, commonplace among contemporaries!— unworthy of his hurtless pride. Burgess Sir’s topmost hair tufts were sooted chestnut; his skin, hardened pigment of peach. His were precious, outspread limbs; their friction rickety like rusted bi-cycle pedals, so that as he tattered away at tree trunk with a springing hold upon it, its bark was in every way rewarded shrapnel so blessed to unwind beneath this particular brand of boy.
The brand of boy was monarchy— mind you— and still he’s to be apotheosized.
None of the above is defining, though; it’s laundry list! It’s tangible mugshot to what was generous in the lure of Burgess Sir. Here’s what isn’t, though: under his tucking wings was sunshine of the heart—of the very heart, hear—and when his small size was tumbled into skyline, untidy silhouette and all, and it was reverberated there, it glinted for the underlying town.
It was so new to its witnesses! Its comeliness was sky-combing confetti!
I won’t mislead with saying it was always to be understood by observers, though— no. It wasn’t. His weirdness and his wonderment, each was often for scoffing and more often, for fancying, but always its self-comprehension was made in the honor of stopping for thought.
He had ample illustrations of young sureness [this all his since as early as 1934], but still he had the keen memory of one recent summer—his summer of hickory-cinnamon sunshine and turtle shells… a near three month spell wherein Burgess Sir lit along native ‘back-castle courtyard’ wearing none but the imposing patriotic token of his country, which is to say: he was a bare-bummed boy, obstinate, donning only a belt of knotted socks hung for the hips, and bellowing [and the only taken breaks of conquering were for lemonade and for splinters, let the record show]. Burgess Sir was given leave to fenced-off fun time that summer, and his kingship overtook bird nest dominion, and pint-sized subjects trotted on to the little tyke’s liking into anthill homestead. These recollected tales of his, along with fist-sized pocket-stuffs of grass, were his for when summer would end, and it was these our boy carried into the ungreat indoors when school would resume again meanly.
He was— Burgess Sir Kingswich—none too pleased for its procession.
And so easy was this string of his opinion in its unearthing that, simply put, he did away with school when it came time. Indeed he did! He reviewed its supplications and [bless its soul!] its whiny, petty call outs to him [rubbish as they were] and politely, he picked other passings of time like tulip tops. Burgess Sir hereby became pioneering soothsayer among his peers and— no matter their collective resentment for his scholarly respite— none dared be so bold as to share his absence with school overseers. This, not because Burgess Sir was a favorite among them, no; his foolhardiness was trial, and its results held hefty affiliations for their own future escapades.
What a pioneer was Burgess Sir; one must applaud it.
Now, at this park bench point in the story, one might stop to wonder what the tale of Burgess Sir might be about… Certainly, it isn’t for his school time hiatus [which ran for thirteen days, for the wonderers] and yet even more certainly, it isn’t for his boyhood nudity and its terrorization of homesteads, no.
This story is Burgess Sir Kingswich’s recorded scroll for his ascension to kingdom! It is in his honor, as is said, and in his defense. His defense? Indeed, his defense. He was an imperfect person to be ruling, he was. Every good intention of his wouldn’t do away with the youth of his situation. And as to his kingdom [I, the narrator, being among them]— oftentimes, it found fault with his silliness in its approach to ruling. Some among them called Burgess Sir a “disruption…” a “rugrat,” you would know. They bullied their King and his boorishness as if it were something wrong with him! and passing time sculpted his indolence into adulthood, so that finally he was presentable and a regular resident to propriety. Gone were the tromping conquers and the infant-like limbs… come 1943, he was handsome and strappingand he found no humor with his dignified post.
Come 1943, he was sensible. Come 1943, Burgess Sir Kingswich had a real name!, he did, and subject underlings no more. Abrupt as it was, it was very real to its subjects and what was among them, their ranks, and the landscape.
Does the reader wonder, then, what this is to mean for me? I am a subject still, am I not?
Indeed I am, and of my own choice. Burgess Sir’s subject I’ll be for the end of my own humble reign, wanted or not. And not only do I serve to defend his dynasty to its critics, I serve to defend it to him! His story is to be told, and by me, and your own judgment as to its bounty will then be fair. I’ll resume:
His ascension was met with bitter dolor by his kingdom, for they mourned its need.
Their former King, he was rugged simpleness and solid. His ruling was sturdy; his jurisdiction, quite wanted. Spearing tragedy was what overtook this King’s wilting limbs in his latest months, and pallor flushed his countryside commandment. His only spot of brilliance was in the cloud light-blue eyes of his boy; eyes that watched his bedside and wiped their glistens along royally-sheeted cotton. The boy just couldn’t make sense of it. And townspeople, they mourned why it was their former King’s reign was to end, and puzzlement was resident to months following His Noble Originality’s ‘retirement.’
His ‘retirement’ was to wood-cabinet and hillside, and His Noble Originality returned his nourishment unto the earth.
But, The King was still young!, they bemoaned.
But, The King had a boy!, was the wail.
And what’s to become of the Dame he had!, she so youthful and winning and lovesome.
Yes, and what of the Dame? Here’s where my advantage of intimacy with the kingdom lies.
What of the Dame? Well, she was taken into the willing arms of a youth so in artless agony with the young death of his hero; yes, into the arms of a Burgess Sir Kingswich. He assumed the alias his belligerent orientation to grief demanded, and he undertook protecting the Dame from what might threaten heartache: be it dragons!, or bartering!, or sunstroke. It was the most precious of plays that Burgess Sir Kingswich— King to the ranks of men and carpenter ants alike— acted in for his tired, tepid mother. Tired as she was, there were sparkles he saw to her eyeline that encouraged him on all the same… and while he was awful young and unready for the rule in all its responsible layers, he’d take it on all the same for the honor of this, his most eloquent Dame…
And when she met with his merchant adversaries, swatting away they were at his silliness of skipping school time or of some other false valiance, she blanched for their benefit at the nerve of her unruly son! and she played her own part of mother who saw that reprimand was needed, until she went home to him. And when she did come home to him [in castle lair, that is], and she was among his boyish brittleness and friendly hugged decrees, she couldn’t understand how they saw him just the way they did. She’d be the boy’s squire forever, she decided, and she’d reign as such with every buttercup lovelump and laced affection special to her…as he’d so done for her.
He was precious.
Subjects—such was the promotion of Burgess Sir Kingswichto noble Lord in his own right. It was deserving, it was, and while recent records might slander the goodness of said Burgess Sir Kingswich, and reminiscent townsfolk might shake their fist for some wonderful, destructive stunt of the Kingswich’s, his reign made cherry-tree honesty of proper folks and it littered curiousness where logic was, and it meant more of smiling for the Dame.
And! let the record show—the only taken breaks were for lemonade and splinters…
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Burgess Sir Kingswich [years reigned:1933-1943] resides in risen body of manhood, now, and so dignified is his habitat. His manor in society is pleasant and appealing, but when time comes for the walk home, and the former King is quite alone—his only pleasantness is rollicking and ruining attire, and Burgess Sir Kingswich is reeling in liveliness. His reign’s now good to the storytellers and the humble historians!, no less, and the name of his reign is good. I say, long live the Kingswich!, and so bless his sovereignty…