The year 1477 was
Significant for two events at least
Charles The Bold of Burgundy lost the cause
And his life. His lands in the Low Countries
Passed to the Holy Roman Empire, freed
From France’s outstretched fingers, where they lie
Later coveted by Spain, but the speed
Of mercantile growth outreached Philip’s ties
That’s still way in the future, though, so I
Will return to ’77, ’cos
That was also when Caxton’s printing press
Produced the first book in English to fly
Tentatively to attentive fingers
A snack that soon would turn into a feast
Is his press a snack / feast as paper was used for keeping fish and chips in later?
ReplyDeleteI guess not but I thought of fish and chips when I read these lines.
Well that's another virtue of paper as an invention. Especially ghost-written autobiographies.
ReplyDelete