Their father was a ghost in 1971, died in a motorcycle crash that year. She was 10 months old and a princess who loved her father, the King. He was three years old and there was a robot in the garage. Years later, when the little boy was 43 years old, his mother bought him a robot pencil sharpener that walked and held the pencil. Years later, when the little girl turned 40, her mother bought her a wine bottle with her name on it.

The King remained a ghost who haunted them because he wasn't there, had never been there, and waited in their minds to ambush all strangers.

Someone wrote a blog yesterday on despair. The Grocers of Despair, as though we were fed despair by an outside agency. Blame is endemic in the world. Where is the spirit of independence and liberty; free thinking?

The princess and the robot boy do not blame. They laugh together and are witty and bright. They despair in silence. 

"Invictus" is one of the best known poems of despair in the English language. Does anyone know the lovely, joyful poem that follows, by the same author?

Invictus