Rapunzel Sonnets

Dreaming from my tower
 In the air
 Higher than the trees
 Surrounding close
 Wondering if men
 Would find me fair
 Footsteps down below
 Break my repose
 The mist about my window
 Hinders me
 From viewing
 Who would enter in my court
 But so few visitors I chance to see
 Intent I am
 On making my report
 And tuning my sweet song
 Towards the earth
 I'll change my fate
 Which left me here since birth
 Six notes
 Only had I sounded
 When
 The footsteps came nearer my prison wall
 Trembled I
 Yet sounded them again
 And from what seemed the pit of earth
 Heard call
 A voice
 Quite different
 From those I had heard
 Though I could count that number on one hand
 My lips
 Too dry to speak a single word
 I wondered
 Why I had not better planned
 And tried in vain to step back from the sill
 For something held my hair
 And kept me still
 I tried to scream
 But sound I could not make
 My frightened wit had robbed me of my speech
 I thought of how my tresses
 I might break
 But spied the scissors
 Just beyond my reach
 Frantically
 I fumbled through my skirts
 Searching for my dagger in the fold
 The same I used
 For tearing linen shirts
 And as I knew
 Not what of me had hold
 To sacrifice my braids
 I raised my knife
 Too late!
 I now must kill to save my life
 My point directed at the stranger's chin,
 No time was left for severing his rope
 But shall I murder him
 Or let him in?
 I was too stunned at what I saw
 To hope for some salvation
 I knew I was lost
 Whichever was my choice
 It mattered not
 The mist had cleared
 My innocence the cost
 And for one endless moment
 I was wrought
 Of human flesh
 And human cares and fears
 The fantasy of fables
 Read for years
 A face it was
 Yea, it had lips and eyes
 But unlike that which greets me in the glass
 In its twin orbs
 I saw no less surprise
 And so we stood
 Two statues made of brass
 I gazing in his eyes
 And he in mine
 As though we might have read each other's thoughts
 He smiled slowly
 As one
 Drunk with wine
 When suddenly the forest rang with shots
 The hunters oft' before had come too near
 And so I bid adieu
 To all my fear
 Hardly knowing half of what I did
 But well aware the half
 I knew was mad
 I grasped his arms as virtue may forbid
 And pulled the creature with what strength I had
 Into the chamber
 To the floor we fell
 Then scrambled I
 To my poniard retrieve
 And asked him now
 At death's third door
 To tell
 Why cam'st he hence
 And bade him not deceive
 For if he should be false
 Despite his beauty
 Though I be fooled
 My dagger knew its duty
 His lips then moved
 But not a sound was heard
 I saw them
 As two petals from a rose
 When finally
 He was fit to say a word
 I was content examining his nose
 He made some mention
 Of a songbird's tune
 I was not listening
 But o'erlooked his brow
 He claimed
 He would have climbed up to the moon
 I wished to give him peace
 But knew not how
 He had not thought his rope a maiden's hair
 Upon my life
 I found the creature fair!
 The deed explained
 He begged of me my name
 "Rapunzel"
 I replied
 "A man thou art?"
 "I am"
 The creature laughed
 "The very same
 How long hast thou been kept from life
 Apart?"
 I told him how
 For one and twenty years
 My home had been the walls
 He saw around me
 How no amount of pleading
 Nor no tears
 Have gained a visitor
 Until he found me
 But when I think upon it
 I recall
 For staring
 He did not hear me at all
 It seemed to me
 We may as well not speak
 His eyes had gone
 As cloudy as the day
 He asked if he might
 Come again that week
 And I knew
 He must soon be gone away
 He took my hands
 And pressed them in his own
 As if by doing so
 He should stay longer
 He told me of the world
 I might have known
 Vowing to return
 And slay my wronger
 Then promising no harm
 His head he bent
 And kissed my lips
 Then out the sill he went
 Lowering himself
 As he had come
 Through the mist
 My creature disappeared
 Riding back
 To all that he was from
 And all that I could never be
 I feared
 And yet
 What raven locks fell 'round his face
 What gentle eyes
 As gray as seagulls wings
 A voice so soft
 My words cannot replace
 The memory
 Of a thousand lovely things
 And so I'll dream again
 Of arms more sweet
 The dagger
 I had dropped
 Lies at my feet