Hour Fourteen –          Sleepless Nights          Mary Pecaut

 

Every night before bed,

Mom and I snuggled and read

fairytales from other lands.

Lessons learned

I didn’t readily

understand.

 

I couldn’t sleep

when Jack and Jill 

tumbled down the hill

or even less when Gretel and Hansel 

lost their way in the forest, trusted a stranger who treated 

them well. The Witch! She caged them, enslaved them

and shoved ’em in the oven.

Such were the Grimm tales of my childhood.

 

As an adult, the stories are clear. The world is a tale of child

abandonment, enslavement, cannibalism, and murder.

 

Little Red Riding Hood skips through the woods –

her basket full of muffins – a fine treat for Grandma

who she discovers in bed

devoured by a wolf.

What have we concluded? Grandma shouldn’t live alone secluded

or be careful of those disguised as someone we love.

 

And what the F–k was Goldilocks doing in the Three Bears Home?

It was never about ‘getting things just right’. For God’s sake,

your story is blown. 

Respect the privacy of others!

We’re to believe that all is hunky dory?

Rest assured, if the Bears owned 

guns, it would have been

a very different story.

 

I dreamed that I might be Scheherazade

famed storyteller of The One Thousand and One Nights 

who taught me – to tell a story well 

just might save your life.