To continue with the perspectives on Snow White, here’s the Woodcutter.
Black hair, red lips and skin as white as snow
I’d often seen her wandering the woods
Trailing ladies in waiting. Seemed to me
She wanted solitude, but then a princess
Is not often permitted to be lonely.
I watched her carefully. She seemed unhappy.
Why would a pampered princess be unhappy?
I should have hated her. But when the snow
Was falling on my hut and I felt lonely
I’d hope she got home safely from the woods.
I didn’t hold a grudge against the princess
Although I doubt she ever thought of me.
The queen, though, she had done a lot for me
She helped me start afresh. I was unhappy
I’d lost my love, no sweet and girlish princess,
Instead a man. They chased him through the snow
When they found out. He fled into the woods.
The queen let me stay here, in secret, lonely.
But it’s the lot of woodsmen to be lonely.
She said that she would hide and shelter me
If I would help her, one day, in the woods.
Today I saw her, and she looked unhappy.
She said. “You must go out into the snow,
And, with your hatchet, disembowel the princess.”
Everyone knew the queen hated the princess
That’s why the girl seemed so depressed and lonely:
She had no comfort but the falling snow.
I knew just what the queen could do to me.
And though the prospect did make me unhappy
I swore to kill the girl, here in the woods.
But when I followed her out to the woods
I found I couldn’t bear to hurt the princess
She knew she was to die, seemed more unhappy
Than really scared. Like me, she’d been so lonely.
I told her, “run. And never mention me.”
And brushed away her footprints in the snow.
I’ll always be unhappy, in the woods
Watching the snow, and thinking of you, Princess,
Do not be lonely. Think, sometimes, of me.
Tom Juniper Poetry 
You’re writing a hundred sestinas in as many days? You must be mad as a hatter. I shall have to subscribe immediately — this one’s quite good!
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Thankyou! Yes, I am indeed as mad as cheese. if you would like to choose 6 words I’ll have a go at weaving them into a Sestina for you, once I’m done with this snow white sequence. Prompts are also appreciated.
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Wow, supper tough chore. Good luck!
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Thanks for posting this. I enjoyed reading it very much. Reading and writing poetry relaxes me and I think it’s soothing for the soul. Great job.
A Poem for Mothers
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Six words, hmmm…hah, OK, I know: word has it I could spare these three — worn, thin, and skin — and for another three to go with them, lessee, how about mad, luck, and prompt?
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Hah! Fair play. 3 more?
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You want nine? Oh, wait, I should have put them in quotes: “mad”, “luck”, and “prompt”. Will those do?
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Oh right. Sorry, I read your comment in the settings and didn’t realise there was more on it. I think snow white’s gonna see me to the end of the week. Check back on monday. Ooh! You’ll be #50!
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Looking forward to it, and the rest of Snow White, too! Are you familiar with Louise Bogan’s “Crossed Apple”? If not, I think you’d like it, although you may want to wait until you’re done to read it, if you think seeing another take on the story might pull you off course.
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Ooh, no! I will look it up after the weekend. I do love the Neil Gaiman story ‘snow, glass, apples’ which appears in the collection ‘Smoke and Mirrors’. I really wish I’d thought of that take on the story first!
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Now I have to read that story, which means I have to read that book. I haven’t delved into Gaiman yet, other than Good Omens, but he’s been on my list awhile. He is an interesting character.
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well expressed tension between the prince and the princess.
thanks for sharing.
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Hehe thanks, but you must be psychic: the prince’s sestina isn’t getting written until Saturday! this is the voice of the woodcutter (I think he’s usually a ‘huntsman’ but I kind of liked him as a woodcutter) who is charged with killing SW. If the prince is gay, too, there’s gonna be a slight problem with the ‘kiss’ scene…
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Heh, that could fracture the fairytale in all kinds of way, what with the seven dwarves and all.
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invite you sharing a free verse with poets rally today.… 9 hours to go before we are closed.
Hope to see you in!
Have A Blessed Thursday!
xxx
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