Waking

By Kristyn McGeehan

Beauty
Her very name states her purpose
An adorment for her father's court
Clothed in jewels and manners.
When she tires of the noble charade
She slips away to spin herself a brighter life,
Sacrifices a drop of blood to spark the magic.
She watches that scarlet life hover on the needle
As she weaves a wall of twisting thorns,
Their vicious points thurned ever outward.

The Prince
His title is weightier than any mere name,
Granting him rights to all within this ancient thicket.
Impatiently, he draws his sword,
Faces the wall meant to block lesser men than he,
Hacks and cuts his way into her heart
Oblivious to the blood weeping from his blade.
He approaches the girl in the core of her sanctuary
Claims his prize before he hears her voice
And wonders at the quiet tears of her awakening.

The Queen
Her prisoning corse traps the curves of motherhood
A golden crown weighs upon the tight weave of her hair.
She moves through her days in a solitary stupor,
No more alive than the portraits upon the walls.
At night she wakes in the sanctum of her mind
In a thicket that her husband's sword cannot breach.
By moonlight she weaves herself a thousand lives,
Each more thrilling than the last
Until the dawn draws her back to cold reality.