Faerie Tales

The Wolves


A pack of wolves, they had said
affronting the demise of attractiveness.
She pursued, determined and deaf
to the advice she didn't seek to find
that beyond the sulking forest life
hid the death of her curious ills.
She had nothing to protect herself with
except her nagging persistence,
a red riding hood that made her
invisible to her own wounds.

With each little step, the forest grew darker,
the bark and skins became hardened amber,
the leaves became green and jaded.
There was a frightening howl from the inside
she heard this from across the path
like ghosts circumventing the heart of graveyards.
Her way forked into not just two paths, but four,
each way representing the call to elements --
life, money, career, and love --
split before her like four suits to a deck of cards,
where, to pick one card would mean
to deal with the whole pack.

And on this nook she had been
affronted by a pack of wolves.
They had said too much
to the ill demise of her naivete.

The Rabbits

.

.

There the rabbit went thru the rabbit hole again
running off with the time, running off from her.
Alice thought to follow him, to squeeze herself
into a shrine she thought would mean a way out.
Instead, she found herself with other rabbits,
all running away, their clocks ticking in circles,
their feet thumping like small fickle hearts.

.

With her slender legs, she walked purposefully
inquiring, drinking through parties, meeting
strange friends and dancing with flowers.
Hardly had she eaten, she already grew so tall
but the little girl inside had no breasts
and her hair and body spoke of frustration.
Inside her womb was a child that'll never be born,
hiding its love and kicking slightly on the walls
as if to wake their mother up into a dash.

She had been running from herself, her soul
crumbling like dried cake, "eat me" it said.
The rabbits started to question her but she
hadn't the time to answer. She was lost again.

.

It was always time to go somewhere, not much
of the day left behind. She would crawl her way
to hide from monsters: a queen that held her head,
a smile from a headless animal, her home
on the other side of the looking glass.
In this hole, the trees would extend their roots
and grapple on her hands the way she held time

like a missing father.

.

Soon, the flowers and cards would riddle her name
Alice, in separate syllables, like animals that feed on
her scalp; she, like a tiny human with claws,

clutching onto a strand of hair before it gets cut.

.

.

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