Death From Misprision Poem by gershon hepner

The death she died was meretricious,
while seated in a limo.
She looked delightful and delicious,
but really was a bimbo
who chose her lovers very badly
and drove fast in a lane
where life would end for her most sadly,
so why do men complain?
A goddess, she, no less than Isis,
it seems her death came from misprision,
and will create a major crisis
since it was caused by tunnel vision.
A people’s princess would have dined
on coffee, cream and carrots
and mixed with people more refined
than doubtful men from Harrods,
and not have needed limousines
to flee the paparazzi
for fear of making tabloid scenes,
an Arab playboy’s patsy,
nor chosen to have upstaged other
more worthy folk by dying
three days before they did, like Mother
Teresa––I’m not lying.
Although, perhaps, I am seditious,
her fame will never wither;
because her death was meretricious
her looks still say: “Come hither, ”
and never will be as capricious
as other women’s when they wither.

Adam Gopnik writes about the death of Princess Diana, writes (“Crazy Piety: The French are relieved that, for a change, it’s the British who are having a crise, ' New Yorker, September 29,1997) .


9/26/97,2/24/09