In her, oily tongued Hughie found his perfect foil:
a cockney sparrow, whose pixie cut and skinny frame
won the hearts of millions in the age of monochrome.
Her money more than doubling as she made the ratings soar,
bringing with it a rags-to-riches change. The sky seemed
the limit, yet something in her ached
for her lost world of nine-to-five, round the corner local,
down-to-earth mates. Until finding herself broken on the wheel
of flashbulb fame, she threw in the towel, hoping to return
to her old, ordinary ways. Instead, uprooted for too long,
she withered, took to God and pills, deadheading herself
with an overdose on one light-starved, February day.
