This body, this ego, this soul –
I’m not sure which, but something is rotten.
Only the Evil Queen knows, but
she’s not making the same mistake twice.
She won’t send the woodsman with his pants around his ankles this time.
I wish she’d just come with her knife,

or maybe a sliver of mirror.

At almost 200 pounds, surrounded by ripe apples and quiet men,
I finally left their table.
Only the Evil Queen knows, but
she’s not sharing her apple cider vinegar spells anymore.
She’s taken every scale, tape measure, and mirror.
She won’t tell us who the fairest is.
We become ever-shrinking violets, our dresses hang.
As scarecrow shaped sirens, we call out for validation –

or maybe a sliver of mirror.

When I peer into my father’s wishing well,
I see now at 30 what I did at 20.
My self-induced lycanthropy, covered in polar bear’s fat and woman’s fear,
has shed. Only the soft white pelt remains.
I am afraid now, and only the Evil Queen knows –
what it’s like to be made of fur and fight, filled with pills, and carved

with a sliver of mirror.