This week the young viking writers explored narrative in terms of collective familiarity and the deeply personal narrative in the family. We read Marie Howe’s “Gretel, from a Sudden Clearing” and Kayleb Rae Candrilli’s “My Mother Believes in My Marriage and this Shows Me Her Heart Can Forgive Even Years Spent Dancing Alone.” The young poets were then tasked with writing a poem inspired by a fairy tale or by a family memory. I am so proud of these daring writers.
“My friend. So ugly in their eyes” by Gracen A.
My friend. So ugly in their eyes, but I
only see the beauty in that face.
Your dirty feathers cleaned off when you cry
one day we’ll fly out of this horrid place
your twisted talons wrap around my own
misshapen face and eyes welled up with tears
bruised wings that shelter me from sticks and stones
that grew majestically over the years
you ran to me, excited by the change
“My wings! My feathers! Pretty, clean, and new!”
But when I look upon this bird, it’s strange:
my friend, once young. I don’t recognize you
I thought I knew you, love, but now you’re gone
My little ugly duckling now a swan.
“She Knows Who Her Grandmother Is” by Alex G.
She knows who her grandmother is
she knows what her grandmother is
before her mother could hide her away
she heard the anguished cries of a chained beast
she saw the scratches under her mother’s sleeves
as she gets taken back home
she’s not allowed to see grandma anymore
she sneaks out at night, anyways
when her mother is asleep
she snatches rodents off the forest floor.
piercing them with her little claws
she leaves them at grandma’s open window
hoping them remind her who she is
hoping she lives long enough to see who her little red is
grandma got sick today
mother said
she isn’t eating right
mother said
I made her a basket of food to go bring it to her
but don’t stay over
other said
she carries it just far enough where mother cant see
and she buries the apples
the bread
the vegetables
the pastries
grandma pries open her sour
dying eyes gaze on her little red
the scent of dead rabbits reaches her old nose
little bloody hands give the basket to her
it’s ok grandma
mother doesn’t need to know
“First Rule of the Sacrifice” by Wynn K.
I love the grandeur of a wedding
the splendor of garlands
and the red carpet rolled out
over the cobblestones cold church floor
stained glass lights dancing on the the walls
I’m dragged down the aisle
in my pure wedding blues
gasping at my soon to be
those lying serpents
at least he can’t hide his beastliness
like the other men.
The bishop stammers through his speech
as the prince curls around my body.
No one claps when we say I do.
My mother mourns
harder than most.
I’m dragged to my chamber;
my promised close behind.
I drop my girdle and hair covering
and sleeves and overgown and skirt and
kirtle and furthinggale then chemise and sticking
a marriage consumed.
