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Illustrated Poems: Of Fairies, Ghosts, Princesses and Winged Beasts
This is a thread for my fairytale-inspired poems.
They don't rhyme, usually, but they are in verses. Most are sad, some are exotic Some might be cruel but all are magical. Enjoy! 1. The Winterking ~The Boy who loved a King~ Illustration There was a village in the mountains where all the houses had pointy tall roofs and icicles under their eaves. Snow never stopped there, Ice never melted there, Everything was so cold and windy and silent- Even the villagers' hearts were frozen. There in the village in the mountains where a boy lived, whose cheeks were red as blood and hair yellow like wheat and heart cold like February lake. He was lost in the mountains like a poor little bird not knowing the sun sets early so deep inside the woods. And as the boy walked, he wondered would he ever find his way back home? Green pine trees stood tall above him, blankets of snow on their limbs. The wind screamed, the ground rattled and the boy was so pitifully scared. And then before him, deep inside the silent mountain, The Winterking appeared before him His hair blue like icebergs and his skin pale like January sun. And the boy, for the first time, felt his heart thaw and melt felt the heat rise to his cheeks Desire burning deep inside his chest. Oh, the boy loved him, the Winterking But that love could not be returned For he was the Winterking The Spirit of icy mountains and the things he loved were the deafening roar of an avalanche frightened hoot of a snowy owl and the midnight call of wolves on moonlit night. And the boy's eyes welled up with tears which stayed wet on his heated cheeks and the Winterking reached out to the boy to wipe off the tear from his eyes. But the moment his icy fingers touched the boy's cheeks The boy was frozen, cold like death pale like the moon and heart silent like a December field. He fell into the Winterking's arms but he was cold, cold as the night Never to be warm again. And the Winterking cried though he could shed no tears he gathered up the boy in his snow white sleeves and took him to his castle to let him sleep like November wind. And from that day on no snow ever touched the pointy roofs of the village. Though it was still cold, and windy and icy, no snow ever covered the tall tops of the pine trees. And that's because the Winterking to make a blanket for the poor, frozen boy gathers up all the snow and fills up his bed Caressing the boy in feathery white to make sure he doesn't feel cold. |
2. The Crime
Illustration " I was the eldest daughter of the eldest daughter, and the future queen of my kingdom. For this I was adored, and polished like a valuable jewel. I was beautiful. Too beautiful; this was a crime. Every day, they milked the golden yolk from the daisies and oiled my hair from scalp to the tips, to make it gleam like strands of pure spun gold. They rubbed emeralds into my eyes so they glittered like the dust of grasshopper wings. I was bathed in apricot milk and perfume distilled from cotton. I drank from the goblets of beetle wings and dined from plates of ruby slivers. I was too beautiful; this was a crime. A winged prince came to me, cloaked in the velvet of the night. He uttered words into my ears soft as spun sugar. He kissed my golden brows, my carnelian-stained lips, my bejeweled lobes; He loved me, and embraced me with the span of his great white wings. Before long, my womb became swollen to make room his child growing within. A maiden was with a child; this was a crime. They shunned me to a tower, so tall that it reached the skies. Its mortar was crushed hydrangeas, and the brick was crushed plums and purple clam shells. They plaited my hair so that it may reach the ground. If any prince was merciful enough to take for his wife a girl impregnated by demons, then they may climb the golden rope to take me. But no princes came, and although my hair reached out to the earth, I reached out to the heavens. I waited for my winged prince to swoop down and claim me. I waited. Moths with golden-green wings flew up to the tower in great swarms, thinking that the tower made with mortars of hydrangeas contained the sweet nectars to quench their thirst. I caught them with my bare hands and drank their golden juice. And the lives inside me grew with each moon- for I knew that the wretched parasites in my womb were not one child, but two; and I wept for not one wretched life but two wretched, miserable lives. I hated my children; was this a crime?" |
Spooky Summer Stories
1. When you are sitting alone at night and there are no one around in sight You hear behind you someone's footsteps making a muffled sound Or the rustles of clothes as they brush the ground And you are certain a cold breath touched the back of your neck and feel as if a clammy hand will come to grab your back. When you look behind you, all you see is empty black space and the blue flicker of the moniter on your face. It's okay to look back, there's no one there No bleeding ghosts, no death lurks there But don't look up. ----------- 2. Once upon a time there lived a young girl who had a terrible disease her skin cracked in finest lines like the dry earth on summer days and each crack on her skin bled so the girl looked as if to shatter at the slightest touch. The girl's mother sought a way to cure her of this horrible affliction She bought medicines, herbs, tinctures of bugs Spoke to a Mudang, performed the Gut all with no avail Until one day, a wise man in her town told the mother of a remedy to cure her of this disease "Boil black sesame seeds in water," said the old wise man "and let the girl soak herself in it" So the mother prepared a bathtub of black sesame seed-water and the girl went in the tub to soak herself in it But after an hour passed and two, ans three, the mother was worried and snuck a peek There the girl was, sitting in her tub picking out the sesame seeds stuck in her skin scratching them from each bleeding crack with a toothpick. |
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