To Be English

[billy]

sorry for the wait i'll concentrate on the edit.

really enjoyed the read apart from the last stanza though i think it may just be me. i saw that part as a bit over the top. mainly the problem i felt the poem had was wordiness and the need for a few more good images.
nothing major though i did leave a lot of black text

great effort jack
thanks for the read.

Second edit:
To be English is to be the shadow of an Empire, i like the opening but it feels a bit wordy a suggestion would be [To be English; a shadow of an Empire,] not sure the title being the same as the first line helps the poem, why not remove [to be english from the first line?]
the depressed brown grass that remains solid image that shows apathy
when a castle has been torn down. feels a little weak a suggestion would a stronger image than torn down, a suggestion be along the lines[when a castle is murdered ](word of choice instead of murdered)

Our lords and ladies,
once kept from the public like sacred relics - all that's required here is [sacred relics]
meant to be admired but nothing else, no need for meant
are flashing their artifacts at us, for a price, [now flash], no need for [at us], as it's a given
in a shallow attempt at siblinghood. i think sibling hood feels forced, brotherhood would work as well, no need for [in ]
They are one with their suits of armour, no need of they are the one, start off with [With]
their coats of arms, their history of oppression,
crumbling beneath them
as sand through an old man's feeble grasp. not a great simile

Lady Sue and Lord Reggie are opening their doors love it, good change of pace.
to the unwashed hordes, revealing their plunder at last, i thing you could switch the front and back parts of this line around to better effect.
to us peasants, us cretins, with our cameras
and fashionable shirts.

The slow death of the aristocracy,
who bathed their whores in Ireland's blood,
and clothed them with its skin,
is a great comedy at which I guffaw feels a little preachy
into my £2 ice cream, two pound (would work on more than level)
while clutching a program
covered by their mopey faces. should it Be mopy?

The royals remain, beneath a pretence of "tourism",
courting grubby dollars and Euros
like the streetwalkers they've become.

With each dying spasm comes an ascendance,
a paving with our lordship's bones Lordship's
the path towards enlightenment,
where the worthless - race, class, "Britishness" -
is replaced by what marries us all: the impermanent soul,
and death, that truly united kingdom. would [that truly united kingdom] look better on it's own line?