An Alphabet of History

by Wilbur D. Nesbit

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Who frets about the mystery, Enshrouding all of history
On reading this will, maybe, see, We've made it plain as A, B, C.

***

ALEXANDER THE GREAT

Alexander the Great was a victim of fate,
And he sighed there was naught to delight him
When he brandished his sword and defiantly roared
And could not get a country to fight him.

All the armies he'd chased, all the lands laid to waste,
And he clamored for further diversions;
And our history speaks of his grip on the Greeks
And his hammerlock hold on the Persians.

Though the Gordian knot, cut in two, in a spot
In his palace was labeled a relic,
Though Bucephalus, stuffed, gave him fame, he was   huffed—
He was grouchy and grumpy, was Aleck.

And the cause of his woe, he would have you to know,
Was the fact that he never was able
To conduct a big scrap that a versatile chap
Of a war correspondent would cable.

'Stead of being quite glad, he would grow very sad
When he told of the fellows who'd fought him,
As he thought of the lack of the clicking kodak
In the hands of a man to "snapshot" him.

We are told that he wept, and in dolefulness crept
Through his palace—the reason is hinted:
There were not at that time magazines for a dime,
And his articles could not be printed.

Though it may seem unkind, ere his life we've outlined,
We must say in some ways he was hateful;
And in truth, we have heard he went back on his word,
And was not Alexander the Grateful.