This is a rewrite of yesterday's. I just workshopped it and came up with some new ideas:

A Few Facts About Queens
.
A Queen Doesn’t Know How to Handle Herself
.
the bile in Queen Elizabeth's veins made her
shriek all the afternoons
the doctors who were barbers on their days off
prescribed leeches for the boiling of her blood
seeing how she would do anything to get rid of it
including flying from the roof of the cathedral
and walking along the bottom of the river
stones sewn into her hems
.
A Queen Is Often Contagious
.
the merchants found Queen Isabel’s teeth and hair useful
all parts could be sold and re-used
except her bones which chattered like sparrows
and her fat which when made into an ointment
caused flower-shaped sores
.
A Queen Gets Lost in Her Dreams
.
the priests discovered they could do
nothing with Queen Margaret
hanging or burning only made her more morose and mystical
until the villages in Wales dreaded her visits
as she would nod into a dream and then shout
predictions about men the color of seals
emerging from the sea to steal their pork
.
A Queen’s Wrists are too Small to Carry a Sword
.
an army of short men led by Queen Mary marched over Europe
eventually the Queen was distracted as Queens often are
by a strange set of velvet skirts in the shop window
when her back was turned she was set upon by crows
who lifted her far into the sun until she became
a lacey star of ashes
her blood boiled away she finally felt peace