This was written for a school assignment, but I rediscovered it recently and liked it enough to post here. Written in iambic pentameter and as close to Shakespearian style as I can get without feeling like a poser. This takes place at the end of the play, immediately before Gertrude drinks the poison cup and dies.
[Gertrude stands looking at the poisoned cup in her hand]
This pool of blood-red wine enclosed in gold,
Stands trembling with the wavering of my hand,
It quivers, jumps— so eager for my choice.
Fatal? My husband, husband-killer warns
With eyes and words away from sipping death.
What matters death, when soul’s already cold?
I should have spilled that dreadful wedding cup,
When husband from another cup still writhed,
Not blackened my own bed with bold incest
And made myself my husband’s brother’s bride.
Yet if I spill this cup, I but prolong
My shameful life, my guilty crimson bed—
And still, I falter. Coward! Steel your soul
To leap into the void— to grasp at peace
If not to have it. Passive you have been—
Now dare you act, and truly live.
Drink this death, and drink it to the dregs.
About the Creator
Lina
northerness junkie through and through
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