Because the World is
by Silver Meteor
It was pretty dark so you could see the stars really big and bright, and I thought how cold the sky was and not welcoming or magical at all. It just made me feel really lonely. A bat flew past like a sharp shadow and I could hear owls and coyotes. The coyote howls were the sound I would have made if I could have. Deep and sad but scary enough that no one would mess with me, either.––Francesca Lia Block,
IV.
I shift aside the scratchy lace and chilly
satin to find a broken angel,
struggling to breathe, a bruise blossoming
on her pale cheek, face dripping with salty sweat.
She sees me, and though it
causes her pain, she lifts up one
thin,
thin arm and strokes my face
with soft, small fingers. She is bleeding in-between
her legs.
She gives me a smile, her eyes haze, and closes her eyes.
She doesn't open them again.
I curl up next to her, and lay my head
across her chest. A flutter of a wounded
bird, after a boy has thrown a stone at it.
Silence.
And I wake up. It is an all-at-once
waking up, catapulting me into
a dark world where little girls
can have nightmares even though all the
stars are out and the breeze is blowing.
Hellie snorts and scratches her rear, and
turns over, muttering about stolen pearls.
Honest'ly, sir, they were in my purse when I left. . .
I hug myself and wait for an explosion, something
loud and big, just waiting. I hold my breath.
I cross my toes.
Nothing but the stars buzzing.
Nothing but Hellie snoring.
Nothing but the trees dancing in the wind.
I get up and leave the cramped room, and climb to the roof.
The moon hangs like a swollen
silver crystal ball, the kind that the teller
uses to form her pretty lies,
full of borrowed light and
false
mist.
The light changes the rooftop to a
færie court, where shadows dance to
a music that is not quite there.
They say the wicked or the very mad can hear it
all the time.
I know it's true because the old woman across the lane
fell out of her door one day, screaming
for the music to stop. I was right there.
She was wicked, and mad. I listened to her
crazed mumbling, before the men came and
held her down.
She promised them her mirror in her hall. She
promised them the bones of her dead son. She
promised
her iron teeth that she had made with the four
horseshoes of the horse that carried her on the first day of her
woman hood, the teeth she had to use when she
traded her real teeth for power. If only the singing
would stop, by the Dark One Himself, make it stop.
I heard them laugh at her.
Come with us, they beckon me, now. Come,
we will never hurt you, for you will be
our sparkling treasure, forever loved, and you will never be lonely.
Our realm is the realm of tangible shadows, shifting twilight moon.
The summer sky will be your stage, and bonny dragons will come
at your beck and call. Come with us, precious child.
We will never hurt you. Our treasure.
Be ours.
The shadows invite me to dance,
and I leap and tumble,
and Robin Longfellow Himself
plays a tune on
his fiddle, alive like something wild and
enough to drive a man crazy.
They shriek and dance, I dance with them,
but leap out again before
they can close their færie ring.
I am too smart for that.
One day, whispers Robin by my ear, you will come with us.
You can't stay here, we have changed you. Our song
makes men crazy. You're half-touched, Child.
One day you will come with us.
This makes me freeze on the inside,
but I laugh and toss my head back like a horse.
Robin Longfellow grins like a pumpkin a-light
from
within, maybe because he likes that I laughed
or that he likes that he scared me.
I think that even if I am a bit mad, I shall always keep my teeth.
I run like I am running from forever, and
swooping down the empty streets
like I have wings.
I run faster.
by Silver Meteor
It was pretty dark so you could see the stars really big and bright, and I thought how cold the sky was and not welcoming or magical at all. It just made me feel really lonely. A bat flew past like a sharp shadow and I could hear owls and coyotes. The coyote howls were the sound I would have made if I could have. Deep and sad but scary enough that no one would mess with me, either.––Francesca Lia Block,
IV.
I shift aside the scratchy lace and chilly
satin to find a broken angel,
struggling to breathe, a bruise blossoming
on her pale cheek, face dripping with salty sweat.
She sees me, and though it
causes her pain, she lifts up one
thin,
thin arm and strokes my face
with soft, small fingers. She is bleeding in-between
her legs.
She gives me a smile, her eyes haze, and closes her eyes.
She doesn't open them again.
I curl up next to her, and lay my head
across her chest. A flutter of a wounded
bird, after a boy has thrown a stone at it.
Silence.
And I wake up. It is an all-at-once
waking up, catapulting me into
a dark world where little girls
can have nightmares even though all the
stars are out and the breeze is blowing.
Hellie snorts and scratches her rear, and
turns over, muttering about stolen pearls.
Honest'ly, sir, they were in my purse when I left. . .
I hug myself and wait for an explosion, something
loud and big, just waiting. I hold my breath.
I cross my toes.
Nothing but the stars buzzing.
Nothing but Hellie snoring.
Nothing but the trees dancing in the wind.
I get up and leave the cramped room, and climb to the roof.
The moon hangs like a swollen
silver crystal ball, the kind that the teller
uses to form her pretty lies,
full of borrowed light and
false
mist.
The light changes the rooftop to a
færie court, where shadows dance to
a music that is not quite there.
They say the wicked or the very mad can hear it
all the time.
I know it's true because the old woman across the lane
fell out of her door one day, screaming
for the music to stop. I was right there.
She was wicked, and mad. I listened to her
crazed mumbling, before the men came and
held her down.
She promised them her mirror in her hall. She
promised them the bones of her dead son. She
promised
her iron teeth that she had made with the four
horseshoes of the horse that carried her on the first day of her
woman hood, the teeth she had to use when she
traded her real teeth for power. If only the singing
would stop, by the Dark One Himself, make it stop.
I heard them laugh at her.
Come with us, they beckon me, now. Come,
we will never hurt you, for you will be
our sparkling treasure, forever loved, and you will never be lonely.
Our realm is the realm of tangible shadows, shifting twilight moon.
The summer sky will be your stage, and bonny dragons will come
at your beck and call. Come with us, precious child.
We will never hurt you. Our treasure.
Be ours.
The shadows invite me to dance,
and I leap and tumble,
and Robin Longfellow Himself
plays a tune on
his fiddle, alive like something wild and
enough to drive a man crazy.
They shriek and dance, I dance with them,
but leap out again before
they can close their færie ring.
I am too smart for that.
One day, whispers Robin by my ear, you will come with us.
You can't stay here, we have changed you. Our song
makes men crazy. You're half-touched, Child.
One day you will come with us.
This makes me freeze on the inside,
but I laugh and toss my head back like a horse.
Robin Longfellow grins like a pumpkin a-light
from
within, maybe because he likes that I laughed
or that he likes that he scared me.
I think that even if I am a bit mad, I shall always keep my teeth.
I run like I am running from forever, and
swooping down the empty streets
like I have wings.
I run faster.