Untitled Poem

In Fairy Tales, a villain arises,

terrorizing the villages of the kingdom,

those gentle souls too easily

falling prey, a princess usually,

blonde of hair and fair of skin.

The villain is defeated by magic, or trickery,

and the princess is rescued by some handsome

prince we all wish we could be, could become,

one strong and sure enough to defeat

the evil forces that we fear, powerless to overcome,

but we stand tall and firm in our resolve

to save the princess, whom we’ve fallen in love with

by this time, rescuing her and richly rewarded

with her hand to live happily ever after. Then,

in our fantasy so far removed from who we really are,

we attach the reality of today, of our own lives,

the princess but a heavy-set woman nagging us, reminding

us of the princes she could have had, the castles

she didn’t get, her crown now tarnished by time and a parcel

of kids, and the prince himself, that prince becoming

a villain to our fantasy, that prince we didn’t become,

couldn’t become, and the dream, too,

of happily ever after, it never came true;

but what else is there to believe in,

in the final tally, but happily ever after

to save us when the villain arises, terrorizing.