Sexburga Drive is a steep mud lane
but Sexburga, she was Queen of Kent
fourteen centuries ago.
She tried to rule as well as reign
but her tough spear-thanes grated No!
she’s but a wife-man, a loaf-kneader:
we will not obey a bodice-feeder.
No precedent, said Witan. Quite unkent
so on Sheppey isle she built a convent.
But now, in an era more Amazon,
the notion has come to the jarl of London,
white-polled Boris, to move Heathrow
east to the marshy Thames outflow
so jetliners may leave their keening cry
out over the Channel and grim North Sea –
and Celtic queens have ruled: Boudicca, Bess,
but your Saxon ones still await redress
so savour this name: London Sexburga Airport.