Saint Celebrity
Complex subject, simple ‘scheme’ . . . Sweet-sacred spring, Paragon of pity, She o’ rare renown; But— authenticity? Filled and stuff’d With insincerity; In genuineness, Evident paucity. Whitewash’d, the ‘habit’: Disguise the reality; Meek-mild surface O’er core o’ vanity. Add big-name journo Lacking in probity, Skillful symbiont In cold complicity. In image-making, What ingenuity: Madam’s art form? Why, self-publicity! Lens and flashbulb! Is’t simplicity?— Method-school acting Of Oscar quality. Icon and symbol Of chaste charity; Any who expose, Oh— the temerity! Corpse’s companion, Religion’s regality; Her Majesty’s realm: ‘Hope’-fill’d megacity. Vending pretences, And shows of comity; The slow-dying man: Her key commodity. Hark! they’ve announc'd: “She is . . . Divinity!” Ah, begone false saint: Thou,— mere celebrity!