How to Change a Frog Into a Prince

Anna Denise

Start with the underwear. Sit him down.
Hopping on one leg may stir unpleasant memories.
If he gets his tights on, even backwards, praise him.
Fingers, formerly webbed, struggle over buttons.
Arms and legs, lengthened out of proportion, wait,
as you do, for the rest of him to catch up.
This body, so recently reformed, reclaimed,
still carries the marks of its time as a frog. Be gentle.
Avoid the words awkward and gawky.
Do not use tadpole as a term of endearment.
His body, like his clothing, may seem one size too big.
Relax. There's time enough for crowns. He'll grow into it.

from The Poets' Grimm: 20th Century Poems from Grimm's Fairy Tales, 2003
Story Line Press, Ashland, OR

Gretel

Andrea Hollander Budy

This poem uses a fairy tale to examine a female stereotype.

A woman is born to this:
sift, measure, mix, roll thin.
She learns the dough until
it folds into her skin and there is
no difference. Much later
she tries to lose it. Makes bets
with herself and wins enough
to keep trying. One day she begins
that long walk in unfamiliar woods.
She means to lose everything
she is. She empties her dark pockets,
dropping enough crumbs
to feed all the men who have ever
touched her or wished.
When she reaches the clearing
she is almost transparent—
so thin
the old woman in the house seizes
only the brother. You know the rest:
She won’t escape that oven. She’ll eat
the crumbs meant for him, remember
something of his touch, reach
for the sifter and the cup.

from House Without a Dreamer, 1993
Story Line Press, Ashland, OR

Dutch

Kay Ryan

This poem is a version of the story of the little Dutch boy who saved his country from being flooded by plugging a hole in a dike with one finger.

Much of life
is Dutch
one-digit
operations
in which
legions of
big robust
people crouch
behind
badly cracked
dike systems
attached
by the thumbs
their wide
balloon-pantsed rumps
up-ended to the
northern sun
while, back
in town, little
black-suspendered
tulip magnates
stride around.

from Say Uncle, 2000
Grove Press, New York, NY

Immortality

Lisel Mueller

This poem will make you remember how time was frozen in the story of Sleeping Beauty.

In Sleeping Beauty's castle
the clock strikes one hundred years
and the girl in the tower returns to the
world.
So do the servants in the kitchen,
who don't even rub their eyes.
The cook's right hand, lifted
an exact century ago,
completes its downward arc
to the kitchen boy's left ear;
the boy's tensed vocal cords
finally let go
the trapped, enduring whimper,
and the fly, arrested mid-plunge
above the strawberry pie,
fulfills its abiding mission
and dives into the sweet, red glaze.

As a child I had a book
with a picture of that scene.
I was too young to notice
how fear persists, and how
the anger that causes fear persists,
that its trajectory can't be changed
or broken, only interrupted.
My attention was on the fly;
that this slight body
with its transparent wings
and lifespan of one human day
still craved its particular share
of sweetness, a century later.

from Alive Together: New & Selected Poems, 1996
Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, LA

Fat Is Not a Fairy Tale

Jane Yolen


I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Cinder Elephant,
Sleeping Tubby,
Snow Weight,
where the princess is not
anorexic, wasp-waisted,
flinging herself down the stairs.

I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Hansel and Great,
Repoundsel,
Bounty and the Beast,
where the beauty
has a pillowed breast,
and fingers plump as sausage.

I am thinking of a fairy tale
that is not yet written,
for a teller not yet born,
for a listener not yet conceived,
for a world not yet won,
where everything round is good:
the sun, wheels, cookies, and the princess.

from Such a Pretty Face May 2000
Meisha-Merlin Publishing, Inc

Bad Day

Kay Ryan


Not every day
is a good day
for the elfin tailor.
Some days
the stolen cloth
reveals what it
was made for:
a handsome weskit
or the jerkin
of an elfin sailor.
Other days
the tailor
sees a jacket
in his mind
and sets about
to find the fabric.
But some days
neither the idea
nor the material
presents itself;
and these are
the hard days
for the tailor elf.

From Say Uncle, 2000
Grove/Atlantic, Inc

Once upon a Time There Was a Man

Mac Hammond

Here's a poem in the form of a fairy tale.


Once upon a time there was, there was a man
Who lived inside me wearing this cold armour,
The kind of knight of whom the ladies could be proud
And send with favours through unlikely forests
To fight infidels and other knights and ordinary dragons.
Once upon a time he galloped over deep green moats
On bridges princes had let down in friendship
And sat at board the honoured guest of kings
Talking like a man who knew the world by heart.
In every list he fought, the trumpets on the parapets,
The drums, declared his mastery, the art of arms;
His horse, the household word of every villager,
Was silver-shod and, some said, winged.
Once upon a time, expecting no adventure
In the forest everybody knows, at midnight,
He saw a mountain rise beneath the moon.
An incredible beast? With an eye of fire?
He silently dismounted, drew his famous sword
And hid behind the heavy tress and shrubs to see
If what he thought he saw was real. He fled
And the giant eye of the moon pursues him still.

from The Horse Opera and Other Poems, 1992
Ohio State University Press