In 1977, the English poet Philip Larkin was commissioned to write a short poem to mark Queen Elizabeth II’s diamond jubilee. Larkin wrote:
In times when nothing stood
But worsened, or grew strange,
There was one constant good:
She did not change.
The penultimate line was the result of a late alteration. Originally Larkin had written, “We had one constant good.” At the last moment he crossed out “We had” and wrote “There was" ... [read more]
