A Treason

At eighty-two he doesn’t visit,
rests mid-stair, forgets mid-sentence,

time a treason all the more outrageous
for having been a man beloved:

who railed, and raged, and gave commands,
yet sits now, mute, while young fools stand—

his good eye’s same old, sovereign squint
the only sign that deep within

there lives deposed, dethroned, none other
than his royal majesty the king, my father

                   ~ Patrick Phillips