Oh, more color of violets they propose to carry, my sisters
Paint their dry lips, their hipbones adjusting to match the latitude of any Prince.
I, only I hide like a star at dawn, tending pumpkins
In our manor garden. The tomatoes speak with their red breaths, the pedestal
Of Brussels sprouts raises its green scepter. In a plot laden with cauliflower, no slipper
Supports my efforts. My feet sweat into my boots.

The dainty toes of Queens nor a delicate Lady's fingers do fit the girth of boots.
My own toes flatten like puddles in a corral of stinking leather as my sisters,
With their velvet countenance, remain in slippers.
I stoke the dinner fire, sew an apple in the mouth of a pig, a fat, goodly Prince
Of a beast. I would measure alterations to show off his skin on a pedestal
If not for all the conversations rolling about the kitchen like pumpkins

Swelling in their patch. The Prince's Ball nears the harvest of my pumpkins.
An October Eve. A festival, kings in lace, halls glitter-scuffed from the golden boots
Of knaves dancing. The Prince announced himself as a groom-to-be, his marble pedestal
Sitting empty as a new moon. So claimed the invitations. Step-Mom goaded my sisters
To accept his challenge the way summer accepts fall. You cannot argue a Prince's
Fate, what with his coming-out Ball and whom, the rumor fanned, spoke soft as a slipper

Gliding on ice. Coronations weight my gut like old sausage. I cannot choose a slipper
To accessorize even my common threads. My cheeks flush orange as pumpkins.
And I can make my own decisions. I have no time to be picked by a Prince.
I clean the gray hairs from Step-Mom's brush, resole my work boots
With tarry sticks. Yes, with their fair hair, breasts dangling like participles, my sisters
Attain a design that fits best on any pedestal

But I claim talents, too. I can decipher the tune of birds perched along their pedestal
Of branches. They twitter the news of the ball with their slippery
Beaks quenched from the pout of berries plucked from my garden. My sisters
Ignore their feathery lessons. You might as well hitch rides to the ball in pumpkins
For all their contentions. Becoming a princess is no different than lacing up your boots.
One foot at a time, that's it. And who really needs a Prince?

I'd rather be a meadow than one flower, a mountain than one stone kept in a princely
Ring. Around here, castles are common. Their spires rise like pedestals.
Only the servants with empty bellies and full chamber pots wear boots.
Step-Mom with one foot dirtying my just-swept floors, the other slipper
Pressing on my back, assures me a Prince wants a daisy, not a pumpkin.
She calls me a worker, a potato with dirty eyes. For beauty she bets on my sisters.

During the ball, I tend my manor garden while my sisters seek their Prince.
While they pirouette I pick fat pumpkins to pile high on a grassy pedestal.
I am not made for a glass slipper. Sorry, Prince Charming, but I'm keeping my boots.

Suzanne Burns Her first book of poems is scheduled to appear from Archer Press of Santa Monica, California next spring. She is currently working on a short story collection, The Dream Tree, and a second book of poems. The second poetry book, The Fairy Tale Sestinas, is a collection of fairy tales and nursery rhymes re-told with a less subservient, more feminist slant. She is also the Associate Editor of Dynamic Patterns literary zine, which is currently accepting poetry submissions. The address: www.dynamicpatterns.com.