The Secret Stead is the pen name of a UK-based writer and
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Heard have you, Will, of our dear friend, Kit?
Forsooth the cruelty of his death does hit
as deep would the loss of a good king's wit.
Stabbed in the back and left in the gutter
in a fight for one of thy boy actors.
Sense now, I do in heart, a breaking part
of me to wonder what he could have been?
A playwright to rival thy art, old crow.
Cry for the stage that will ne'er again see
the alchemy of his dark poetry.
What would he have presented to this eye
and stomach to digest as time went by?
Aye truly, a prince in standing was he.
What black Fate said, this be thy eulogy?
William Shakespeare:
I feel thy loss and multiplied, dear Ben,
Kit was not my rival; I was his friend.
A friend's loss be now multipled by ten.
He was my standard to which I did write,
to best his words was to better thyself.
My words and thoughts are now in a dark room
without his sweetest form and brightest light.
He was not my rival. In truth, I his.
Yet as good friends to him we do know this;
the talent that God gave, did give him rise.
Alas, his actions of a stricken fool
in love did bring about his sad demise.
Aye truly, a sweet prince of words was he.
Yet his black fate was his own eulogy.
Ben Jonson:
Should we not blame the fault in our stars
if low we fall from its telemetry?
For his actions thus tied to talent born;
his wild nature was in his symmetry.
He fought as bravely as his words would do;
he balanced his life on a sword of sorts,
where he walked a sharp edge of high and lows.
Now he is cut down shall we berate him?
We ingest the leaf of the tobacco,
as did he. Here now do we not drink, too,
the strongest beer, as all do in this inn?
His a life larger than we can fit in.
Such a prince to never sit on his throne.
A nation of words left to thrive alone.
Shakespeare
Thou art in truth, the messenger, my friend,
for I am one subject of that nation,
whom now his dearest prince and son hath lost.
Yet in the deep pull to his wanton lust,
many times he did forego his subjects,
to chase and rouse pretty little objects.
Know the young boy actor of which you speak?
Too young to know to turn the other cheek.
He corrupted the weak and the willing.
Money spent in habit of no morrow.
No thought in head when it was down below.
Aye, was a saint of sin, our Kit Marlowe.
Such a prince never wears a crown easy.
A king becomes, when man knows duty.
Ben Jonson:
True, too rash was he in lust and action.
Aye, that was his life after a fashion.
Yet, I, too remember the dreams we shared.
Here around this table, his words of fable.
How he had power to make the spirit soar;
to hear the oceans roar in our ears,
to make this skin on thy very body
move just by the force of his emotion.
The nights we spake the maids to distraction!
The loyal friend, there with thee in a fight.
Gave his last penny, if thee were in debt.
Aye, so much joy and laughter that we wept.
The throne is empty, yea, so is our loss.
Such a prince now to turn to bone and dust!
Yea, the loss doth fetch an empty vessel.
Yet, one thee are now duty bound to fill
with thine pen, page and verse; and his bright stars
to guide us by his better memory.
So write shall I. Princes of great import,
aye, of one dark soul lost to his thorn'd crown,
of a Dane who ne'er took king to his name.
Not selfsame, of the fifth Henry shall I
write in time, most excellent of princes
thou hast known. Of a young Harry's deeds there
shall I speak to the best in Saint Marlowe.
Make him live, say, as I would that he were.
The throne is empty, but not so our loss.
Words will enthrone a prince in his repast.
Ben Jonson:
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Aye Will, so he rises and falls to rise
again in our words, indeed, that cry
to the page and to the stage that now sounds
with the absence of his precious vowels.
Yet, still I mourn for all the words that will
never dance to the tune of his own sound.
The ground feeds on his talent thus gone.
I feel this cold of truth like loss of sun.
What play, on what day, can ever tell us
what the morrow brings, when we are such dust?
Yet, I am reminded we are such dust
that sings, and laughs, and feels our lust.
Yea, not so intently as did our friend.
May't be he burned bright knowing his brief end.
Published 13 April, 2026
