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The Owl Prince or

Why Beauty can be Deadly

 

Beauty was brought before the King in black, sack black,

hair pulled back with a twisted vine. She didn’t speak

or smile, fooled no one. Bone structure is bone structure.

 

In deference, she lowered her eyes, so the King addressed

the top of her head, a head that turned heads throughout

the realm. Her dazzling smile she tucked up her sleeve.

 

Hear ye, Beauty has stabbed the Owl Prince twelve times.

Convinced his son’s death was imminent, the King

waited until the last minute to order Beauty beheaded,

 

the ultimate price for slaying a Royal, whereupon

a breathless courier announced that the Owl Prince

was seen galloping off on his stallion, sharing the saddle

 

with a redheaded wench, same wench the Owl Prince

diddled in the Royal Gardens while the Gardener snipped

long-stemmed roses for Beauty. As for the stabbings,

 

Beauty pleaded not guilty: Your Majesty, he brought me

roses every day, every day we made love on a bed of petals.

What was I supposed to do? He stole inside me like a thief.

 

Then Beauty smiled a smile that so bewitched the King

he ordered her released and took her for his Queen.

Hearing the news the Owl Prince returned, but Beauty

 

barred her door to him. Undeterred the scoundrel forced

himself within, whereupon the next day, his body

was found floating face down in the Maun River shallows.

 

 

 

The Lanky Fisherman or

Why the Winter Wind Howls over Mersey Lake

 

Little Red Riding Hood was a ten-year-old boy

who liked to wear girl’s clothes. The lanky fisherman

spotted Little Red Riding Hood on the footpath

to Grandmother’s bungalow near Mersey Lake.

The old woman was not ill; she was hearty, tended

her garden and cared for retired rescue dogs.

She didn’t particularly like her grandson.

He would whine like a girl when she needed

an extra hand to help with the chores.

When Little Red Riding Hood strayed to the water’s

edge to skip stones, the fisherman whipped out

his fly fishing rod. Although the old woman

had dismissed the stories as gossip, that

was about to change. Hearing her grandson’s shouts,

she grabbed the fillet knife she used to scale

the plucky smallmouth bass which had made

Mersey Lake an attractive vacation spot,

took after the fisherman, and separated him

from his handcrafted pole.

To this day, you can hear the son-of-a-bitch howling

like the winter wind across Mersey Lake.

 

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