She’s the last of the fairy tales.
The mobs came with pitchforks and torches.
The ashes of the golden era stains her skin.
Her magic dwindled, wounded by the sins of man.
She seeks not revenge, nor justice.
She seeks punishment.
I have been the guardian of her heart;
A heart she feels she no longer needs.
There will be a day where it beats again.
Not this day.
On this day she waits in the dark,
Waiting for the day her memory is forgotten;
The day her tragedy becomes a myth.
On that day, reckoning will come
To remind them their cruelty is unequalled
By the spirit of a fallen star.
On that day, I will be her harbinger.
On that day, I will resurrect the memory
They wished would stay buried in the depths.
On that day, the hearts of man will cry for mercy,
Only to fall upon deaf ears...
Because I made a promise.
Cross my heart, she’ll never die.
Look your devil in her eyes.

I am a princess. Climbing the metal castle
surrounded by the forest of julienned trees.
A pink tutu complete with a fortune of tulle
flows at my waist, replacing the cotton of
normalcy given that morning by the queen,
my army turning into peasants on the ground
below me. Fellow children who wish not to
play with royalty, fellow children who do,
but alas, this princess works alone.

Sliding down into the moat, swimming across
the wooden hot sea, I enter my limo, the red
skeleton of a car, pushing soldiers out of my
way. They obey their highness, they always do,
or their actions are blocked from memory, a
storm of denial sugarcoating my beloved fantasy.

The limo, transformed during the voyage into
a shimmering carriage, stops at a stable, four
trusty steeds at disposal for any who come
across them. One’s fur the grey of used snow,
stomped upon by the hooves of peasants lasting
generations. Another the brown of rich milk
chocolate, named by those consumed with
hunger, to be used by the full returning from
high tea. A third the shimmering blonde as
the prince’s hair, the appalling matte of gold,
the foil of the one before. The last, dark as
night, a hidden soul trapped behind the plastic
eyes, watching as wars pass, powers change,
alliances grow and crumble into ruins.

The steed stops upon the princess’s destination,
the lone place in the kingdom where she can find
peace, where the chattering of peasants can no
longer disturb her daydreams, where she and her
court can enact royal business, where the swing
of her gavel rings loud and clear, where she can
study in peace, where she can play, where her
throne lies, two abandoned sisters sitting near.

It is here that the princess finds her solace; it is
here that the princess erases from her memory.

I am not a princess
that needs to be saved.

I am a broken warrior,
a Valkyrie in distress.

An echo of a forgotten
strength that always comes

back in vigorous ways.

Sandoval