Five Fascinating Poems by Jeana Jorgensen

 

Betrothed to a King

 

I knew what I was getting into,

wedding a king who'd been

betrothed before.

 

Princesses vanish all the time:

turned into frogs and cats,

made housekeeper to a witch,

buried in holes.

These things happen.

 

Our alliance was a good one,

my family noble enough,

the king kind enough,

the staff pleasant,

the mother-in-law overjoyed.

 

The courtship slipped by

like a sunset

and the rumors were mercifully few

(the first bride could charm birds from the sky,

toss flour onto coals to make exquisite bread,

dance like a gazelle, and of course she was beautiful).

 

I allowed myself one small rebellion

against tradition.

I thought I was safe.

 

Lulled into security by her absence,

by his slow, small smiles,

by fleeting touches that became lingering,

I ignored my upbringing.

(A marriage is just an alliance;

A good wife's first duty is to bear children,

And next, to be a virgin on her wedding night,

And finally, to love her husband.)

 

The night before the wedding,

I crept unseen to his chambers.

I spelled one guard to sleep;

What good is magic if unused?

 

Hesitant at first, his caresses transformed

From dove kisses to dog bites,

Firm and insistent, binding us together.

 

I did not regret it til the next day,

Sitting at the wedding feast,

Sharing wine and sly glances.

 

Suddenly a girl—

Radiantly beautiful, haggardly thin.

Her smile a knife to my heart,

His eyes a blow to my soul.

 

My mind stuttered on a spell

(Iron shoes? Cavern exile?

Transform into a bird,

Chain to a sea monster?)

And too late I heard his voice

Ringing out into the stunned silence.

 

“If I lost the key to a treasure coffer

And had a new one made,

But the old key was found,

Which should I keep?”

 

A key.

I was a key.

An object to be used

And discarded.

My fingers,

Wrapped around my wedding wine,

Stiffened and tensed,

Clutched as if for her throat.

 

There was little left for me to do

But disappear, my wedding dress

Clinging like a shroud

With my cheeks afire:

Anger, betrayal, shame.

 

No longer a token for my family,

Shunted from the traffic in women

To…what? Where? Who would I become?

Would I wear these wintry colors

To hide a trampled heart,

The hot flush of shame, forever?

 

This much I know:

There is no safety in life.

Never count on a princess to stay gone.

And I am no key.

 

The Ogre’s Heart

 

I know the secret

of the ogre’s heart

within the casket.

 

I am throwing my clothes

into garbage bags

and bundling those into my car

and wiping snow from my hair

while the white silent world

vibrates with the sound of my breathing.

 

I will get through this.

 

There is a trunk within my storage unit

with a hollow ottoman inside it

and wrapped in a blanket is

our wedding album.

 

Inside the album

Inside the blanket

Inside the ottoman

Inside the trunk

Is…not my heart, but a memory of it:

Sun-filled laughter,

Gleaming eyes and smiles,

Transparent images,

Ghost-selves of a dead past.

 

In the fairy tales,

the princess held captive by the ogre

betrays him with the location of his heart,

given to the hero on a bed of promises:

eager, yielding, spreading thighs/lips/heart.

 

Outside the storage unit

frost cakes on my face

and, shivering, I unload the last of it,

the last vestiges of this life

failed, this union unfulfilled.

Frozen, I see the remainder stored:

tax forms, cutlery, the fucking welcome mat.

Mechanically, I move it all inside.

 

The ogre is not the villain.

The ogre stored his heart in a casket

to protect it, not from some dumb ass hero

but from the unfiltered humanity around him,

that could so effortlessly reduce him to tears.

The ogre has important ogre shit to do.

The ogre has to get on with his day.

The ogre cannot afford to be distracted

by weeping princesses, sniveling heroes, and the like.

 

If I had tears to weep,

they would freeze on my cheeks.

But no heart means no tears.

Blank-faced, I’m only aware

of an uncomfortable fullness when I blink.

 

The last of it is stored.

I’m leaving my home.

The secret of the ogre’s heart

(in a casket, inside a duck, inside a swan)

Glitters within my eyes.

Nobody will unlock it or find it

Until I’m ready to stop my mad pacing,

Panting, my frenetic plotting to escape

The prison that looks like a house.

 

The stories have the princess running away.

Maybe she was, but I know the truth:

The ogre had run away long

before the princess ever showed up.

The ogre is still running.

It’s easier to run when you are heartless.

 

Someday, if some stupid hero doesn’t destroy it first,

The ogre will tenderly lift his heart from the casket

And reinsert it into his chest:

Take a deep, shuddering breath

And begin to live once more.

 

I lock my storage unit.

I drive away.

 

My heart is not inside,

It is nowhere to be found.

I gracefully extricate myself

(to whispers of, “how does she hold it together?”)

And I survive mostly-whole.

And the only reason I smile

Is because of my heart,

Locked safely away,

Shut away so that I can do the unthinkable

And endure the extremes of human emotion

And maybe someday adopt a princess

Who will show me why storing hearts in places

Is not the best way to live forever.

 

Given or Sold or Stolen Away

 

Wife of white bear,

Captive of beast,

Wyvern’s bride,

Monster’s feast:

Here is a list of women,

Girls like you and me

Promised to exotic husbands

Never to be set free.

 

Fathers who gamble

And brothers who lie

Trolls who cheat

And mothers who die:

Who to blame

When we’re stolen away,

Who to curse

On our wedding day?

 

Give me just one story

And make it true,

Of a girl who escaped,

Who grew wings and flew.

Or better yet, was never sold,

Never given, never stolen away,

Who was her own story’s hero,

Not a man’s stowaway.

 

Coat of a Thousand Furs

 

Animals are dumb

(I mean that in a good way, I promise).

I know because I was a princess.

 

My people gave me

Bangles & baubles

Until my mouth was stuffed up

With doubt and I could not speak:

Is this a true friend’s gift,

A bribe, a torrent of flattery?

Consolation for my mother’s death?

Something to blackmail me with

If it’s later found in a man’s bedchamber?

 

My father gave me dresses:

As gold as the sun,

As silver as the moon,

As sparkling as the stars.

Beauty to mask a monster’s proposal.

You know the story.

 

My animals gave themselves,

No more, no less.

Wordless furry bodies pressed

Against me for comfort,

Gaping mouths asking for the same

Assurances of food, warmth, grooming.

 

By the time my father

Asked for my hand in marriage

My words had almost all fled,

Gone to ground,

Burrowed deep inside,

Hibernating.

 

I felt bad asking for the coat.

Physically bad – my voice had rusted

From lack of use, scraping out of my throat

As though my tongue had grown bristly,

In advance of the rest of me.

 

I kept my favorites alive, of course.

I asked for a coat of furs from the forest animals,

But still felt sick knowing what was coming,

My pets, my mute friends, my comfort.

 

Animals are dumb: their silence guaranteed.

The perfect conspirators.

Quiet lumps in my bed,

Like my corpse of a tongue

Immobile in my mouth.

 

Assemble enough small forest animals,

Household pets, more or less domesticated,

And you’ll have enough blood

To make it look like a human bled out.

Add in a few pig bones,

Tear out tufts of your own hair,

Create a trail of bloody wolf prints

Leading away from the scene.

 

Of course I bled too.

They fought back, my only friends,

For what creature does not cling to life?

 

More than anything, though,

Animals are dumb because their faith is

A whole thing, not unbreakable

(We’ve all seen dogs mistreated,

Cats skittish around water because their

Kittens or littermates were drowned)

But rather, inviolable.

It’s there or it’s not,

The same way a forest is.

 

Now I am mute beast,

Escaped burly bride,

And I too shall be a dumb animal

Until my heart restores

And my tongue sheds its skin

And even then, I may keep this coat

Instead of shucking it

On the chance of a new human life.

I know all too well what humans are capable of.

 

The Old King Dreams

 

The old king dreams:

the girl, his girl, giggling

as she disappears around a corner,

feet pattering, tail dragging behind her.

 

He runs after her, trying to catch a glimpse,

knowing what he will see:

the blond locks from his wife,

her sparkling eyes too,

but a face that is his, his, his.

And a lithe body draped in a skin,

the pelt of his favorite donkey,

the one he’d killed for her brideprice

(with every bray a gold piece would fall from its lips:

no more, but what was wealth without happiness?).

 

He turns the corner,

hoping to catch up and coddle his girl

and hold her tight and next—

 

But what rears up on hind legs is

no longer a human in an animal skin

or the size of a human, but larger,

and it sets upon him, ripping out

chunks of his flesh with knifelike hooves

and braying, blood-flecked teeth.

 

The old king screams until he wakes up.

 

He falls asleep again and dreams the same dream.

 

Bit gory, but it gets the job done,

says the fairy godmother,

after she and the girl visit the king’s dreams.

The former princess nods.

You could undo it, you know, if you find a new home,

get betrothed, invite him, and cook him a meal

made entirely without salt.

Otherwise, he’ll eventually die or go even madder

from lack of sleep, not sure which will happen first.

The girl shrugs, drawing the skin cloak around her

thin frame even tighter, clutching her bag

with dresses to secure her future.

I never really could cook, she says.

All right, replies the godmother.

Off we go then.

Jeana Jorgensen earned her PhD in folklore from Indiana University. She researches gender and sexuality in fairy tales and fairy-tale retellings, folk narrative more generally, body art, dance, and feminist/queer theory. Her poetry has appeared at Strange Horizons, Nevermore Journal, Liminality, Glittership, and other venues.