Fairy Tales
The perky, pretty little blond,
blue-eyed first grader
charmed Miss Konkle with her quick answers
and love of alphabet, stories, numbers. Charmed
too, Miss Brown, Mrs. Walter and Mrs. Horton.
charmed Miss Konkle with her quick answers
and love of alphabet, stories, numbers. Charmed
too, Miss Brown, Mrs. Walter and Mrs. Horton.
Caraboose, the bad fairy who put Princess
Aurora
to sleep, along with the whole castle, was on the loose
doing a lazy fairy’s job: letting hormones destroy
the charming little girls -- many of them, perhaps most.
At twelve, the feet grew huge, arms hung gangling,
blond hair turned dishwater dull and drab, and a bean
pole body was slow to round out like the bodies of Barbies.
Myopia blurred the vision in the mirror; glasses were needed.
“Boys don’t make passes at girls who wear glasses.”
to sleep, along with the whole castle, was on the loose
doing a lazy fairy’s job: letting hormones destroy
the charming little girls -- many of them, perhaps most.
At twelve, the feet grew huge, arms hung gangling,
blond hair turned dishwater dull and drab, and a bean
pole body was slow to round out like the bodies of Barbies.
Myopia blurred the vision in the mirror; glasses were needed.
“Boys don’t make passes at girls who wear glasses.”
Oh, I knew, just when my brain matured
enough to know
such things, that I was a mess. No dates for me, no boy
friends, none of those delicious teenage delights
in Seventeen. Teacher’s pet was a curse, excitement
about the Metropolitan Opera Saturday broadcasts instead
of Elvis or even Sinatra, part of the thorny hedge
the ugly fairy erected around me. I knew no Prince
would ever cut through the briars and kiss me
ever so gently -- oh, god, how I wanted that magic kiss!
such things, that I was a mess. No dates for me, no boy
friends, none of those delicious teenage delights
in Seventeen. Teacher’s pet was a curse, excitement
about the Metropolitan Opera Saturday broadcasts instead
of Elvis or even Sinatra, part of the thorny hedge
the ugly fairy erected around me. I knew no Prince
would ever cut through the briars and kiss me
ever so gently -- oh, god, how I wanted that magic kiss!
Princesses in
fairy tales don’t get to go to college.
I wasn’t born a princess and only Disney believes in fairies.
The good old Greyhound bus and the shot-straight roads
of Indiana took me to cities beyond the corn fields.
The mirror on the wall never did say I was “fairest of them all”
but I didn’t have to live with seven variously handicapped dwarfs.
I did have to wise up, forget about princes and learn about Erica Jong
and Gloria Steinem. I looked down and saw those once gallumpy feet
were a very solid foundation for standing on.
I wasn’t born a princess and only Disney believes in fairies.
The good old Greyhound bus and the shot-straight roads
of Indiana took me to cities beyond the corn fields.
The mirror on the wall never did say I was “fairest of them all”
but I didn’t have to live with seven variously handicapped dwarfs.
I did have to wise up, forget about princes and learn about Erica Jong
and Gloria Steinem. I looked down and saw those once gallumpy feet
were a very solid foundation for standing on.
Caraboose [design for Sergei Diaghilev's production of ballet "The Sleeping Beauty"-- Léon Bakst
In 1634 Giambattista Basile wrote "Sole, Luna, e Talia," the prototype of the "Sleeping Beauty" fairytale; as s foretold by an astrologer, Talia pricked her finger and fell into a deathlike sleep; she was raped by a king and gave birth to twins, one of whom, hungry and unable to find her mother's breast, sucked on her thumb instead and drew out the flax splinter that caused her mother's condition, thus waking her up. In 1697 Charles Perrault adapted the story as "La Belle au bois dormant" (The Beauty in the Sleeping Wood), introducing an unnamed witch who cast the spell on the heroine. In the same year Marie-Catherine Le Jumel de Barneville, Baroness d'Aulno (who coined the term "contes de fées" -- fairy tales) wrote "The Princess Mayblossom" about a princess who was hidden away by her parents in an attempt to escape a curse by the witch Carabosse. At some point the witch's name became associated with the evildoer in the Sleeping Beauty story, an identification which was solidified in the 1890 ballet "Spyashaya krasavitsa" by Marius Petipa and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky; the ballet also gave the sleeping princess her familiar name, Aurora. In Walt Disney's 1959 animated film Aurora was the last princess the studio produced until "The Little Mermaid" in 1989 due to the film's poor box office and critical reception, caused in part by her depiction as (in Leigh Butler's description) "a Barbie doll knockoff who does nothing the whole film but sing wistfully about Finding Her Man, before becoming the ultimate passive Damsel in Distress." Two of the leading promoters of American feminism are Gloria Steinem, whose 1969 article in "New York" magazine "After Black Power, Women's Liberation" was one of the movement's seminal milestones along with the "Ms." magazine she founded in 1972, and Erica Jong, whose 1973 novel "Fear of Flying" dealt candidly with female sexual desires. In the 16 August 1925 edition of the "New York World" Dorothy Parker publisher her poem "News Item":
ReplyDeleteMen seldom make passes
At girls who wear glasses.