The word is German in its origins
But has been showing up in British culture
Since 1932, or thereabouts
In this context at least: the supernatural.
It comes from an archaic word for corpse:
Specifically a man, one of great power
Of royalty perhaps: no common peasant,
Who works dark magic, hoping to cheat death.
And thus, he becomes something half alive:
Handsome at first, in an unearthly way,
But as the years pass, the decay sets in
And he becomes cadaverous and gaunt.
Though he appears fragile, filled with rot,
The lich is said to wield unholy power
Controlling those who worship him and serve him
And forcing them to carry out his will.
There’s only one known way to kill a lich:
The creature has imbued his vital essence
Into a thing that he esteems as precious.
Destroy that, and you will destroy the monster.
(I did read, recently, somewhere or other
That someone had “destroyed the royal family”.
But that’s not really relevant, I’m sure.)

This is somewhat inspired by this episode of The Allusionist in which Harry Josephine Giles proposes the word “trowie” as a Scots equivalent of “queer”, based on the idea of the magical otherness of trows, which are similar to trolls or fairies.

You say I’m shy.
I say, maybe I just don’t want to talk to you.
You’re really not all that interesting to me.
I don’t do small talk
With small minded people.

You say I’m rarely seen.
I say, maybe you’re just not looking hard enough.
I see you all the time.
Too much, if anything.
I can’t help it if you always look right through me.

You say I’m ugly.
I say, well that’s a bold claim
From somebody who just said they never see me.
Somebody whose idea of beauty comes from magazines.
The day I look pretty to you,
I’ll get a makeover.

You say I’m mischievous.
I say, if you can’t take a joke
Maybe you shouldn’t be the one
Calling me ugly.
I’ve got a sophisticated sense of humour.
Not my fault if it goes over your head.

You say it’s unlucky to see me, but auspicious to hear my voice.
I say, hark at you with your fancy words.
“Auspicious!” Free music, more like.
As long as I stay out of sight
And don’t frighten the horses
You’re happy enough to listen to my songs, and not give me the credit.
Is that it?

You say I’m magical.
I say, fair enough:
I’ll give you that.

More magical than you will ever be.

This one’s for Fay Roberts.

About the hut:
She’s a sweet old thing really.
Has her little ways,
Don’t be surprised if you wake up at the opposite end of the forest
to where you went to bed.
Terrified of foxes, you see.
Bolts at the sight of them,
Which sounds silly enough given her size,
But you must remember she’s part chicken.
On that note,
You cannot be too careful with her feet.
Watch out for signs of leg mites,
bumblefoot and gout.
I find a good rub down with salve
Once a week at least
Tends to keep her in fine fettle.
I’ve written down the recipe
(Just mind you don’t mention the goose grease:
it upsets her so.)
Then there’s the eggs.
You will generally find a kennel or two lying about outside in the morning.
She’s always been a decent layer, bless her.
I usually sell them at the market
In my sweet old lady get-up.
Traditional Baltic Handicrafts, my sign says.
People will pay a good price.
It’s best to smile, and keep your mouth shut.

Have your teeth started coming through yet?
Your new ones, I mean.
You’ll find that the rust is a bit of a bugger:
Swap out your regular toothpaste for zinc.
You’ll get used to it.

The mortar and pestle.
It does tend to list a bit.
You’ll notice the dents?
The small one’s where I brace with my foot
The larger one…
Well, you’ll work it out,
It’s surprisingly comfy.
Take-off is tricky
compared to a broomstick,
But once you’re airborne, well.
You’ll never look back.
Just push off hard with the pestle.
Get the hut to give you a kick it you’re struggling at first.
You’ll get the hang of it.

Well, that’s about it!
Make sure you gobble up a few kids now and then –
Just to keep the locals on their toes
And showing the proper respect.
And if a young maiden shows up
Seeking your counsel
Eat her, or help her seek her fortune:
Your call, really.

Best of luck,
I’m off.
Do Svidaniya!

I’m sure in the past you’ve been told
If you find me, I’ll give you the gold
That I’ve hidden away.
I’m a trickster, they say.
Yes, the story’s incredibly old.

And you’ll swear that you think that you’ve seen
Me, a little old man dressed in green
In a forest or field
And you’re sure that I’d yield
My treasure. You seem pretty keen

Not to meet me, but claim what I own
And I’m pretty damn sure: once I’d shown
You the cash, you’d vamoose
Cut the leprechaun loose
I won’t lie, I feel pretty alone.

It’s not all that it’s cracked up to be,
Having treasure, and that you’d soon see:
If I gave it to you
You’d be rich, that is true.
And then people would treat you like me.

Not to be confused with the basilisk, this creature is captured by the people of Val Camonica, Italy every Epiphany, whereupon it reveals gossip about the people it’s seen getting up to mischief over the year.

Signorina Gabriela’s
Eating sweeties on the sly
And she’s says she’s on a diet
But I tell you, it’s a lie.
And that old Signor Brambilla
Stays in bed long after nine
And he says that it’s a migraine
But it isn’t, it’s the wine.
I have seen Signora Rossi
So polite to all her neighbours,.
In their gardens late at night
Stealing the fruits of all their labours
And the postman, Signor Rocco
Has delivered more than letters
To Guiseppina the waitress
(But she likes the baker better).
For you know I’m always watching
From the forest, all the year
And I see your little secrets,
And I hear the things I hear.
Every January you catch me
And you lead me in to town
So I know that you must want
To hear the gossip that I’ve found.
It is good to start the year off
With a slate that’s been wiped clean
I don’t like to cause you trouble
I’m not trying to be mean
But when you are misbehaving
Just remember there’s a risk
That your deeds will be recounted
By your local badalisc.

CW for ancient Greek style misogyny/rape culture

Women like me have always been called monsters.
If you are not a virgin or a wife
You’re, well, I’m sure that you’ve heard all the names.
And if you are a virgin or a wife
And then some man – or god – decides he wants you,
Takes you by force, well, then you’re bad enough:
You can at least expect to be transformed,
In people’s minds, to something less than human.
Yes, violated women get the blame
For what’s been done to them against their will
Get cursed by jealous wives or guilty husbands
But somehow no-one blames the violators.
A woman who decides to break the rules
Who chooses sex on her terms, no one else’s
Well she’s not just inhuman, she is monstrous,
An ugly bitch. Man-eater. Femme fatale.
Yes, I was angry. But I didn’t shout
My death stare was enough to silence them.
And after that, I kept out of the way
I didn’t look for trouble, but it found me
Because this cocky little squirt turns up.
This fucking incel. Turned up for a bet
Apparently. Some drunken lads’ night out
“Bet you can’t kill the Gorgon!” “Bet I can!”
He won the bet. Because women like me,
The femmes fatales, don’t get a happy ending.
They say that I deserved my grisly fate.
So look me in the eye and tell me that.

Happy Easter. Have a terrifying egg

A cockerel’s egg, hatched by a snake:
Something impossible combined
With something else unlikely, make

A creature that should not exist
Abomination. Some mistake
Of nature. Not on any list

Of possible anomalies
A serpent king, that with its hiss
Destroys each living thing it sees.

Except for the mustelidae
specifically, the common weasel
No-one knows exactly why

This tiny mammal knows a way
To overpower, terrify
Something invincible. They say

Nothing, however terrible
Can leave us without hope. That’s why
Although it seems improbable

There’s always something that can make
A nightmare become risible:
Just some pathetic chicken-snake.

Maybe I’m just a horse
That somebody said
That somebody said
They thought had a horn
on its head.
They said it seemed to behave differently:
Better than the rest.
Maybe a rumour about a creature from far away
With a tusk, a horn
Something like a horse but
not a horse.
The description changed to fit
the perceptions of the people
hearing the story.
And those people knew about horses.

Expected a horse.
Or perhaps there was a bull whose horns grew strangely.
Twining towards the centre of the forehead
Changing the shape
of the cranial cavity
And this trained the brain differently
caused the bull to act in ways
the people there perceived
as gentleness, nobility
And because people associated
Nobility with horses, not cattle
They changed the story.
And people brought the tusks of narwhals home
From voyages
But a story about a whale with a horn
Was too strange for the people
Who just wanted a horse
to be better than other horses.
Maybe what I am
Is the idea
That something can be better
Than what we expect.
But we still want it to be
What we expect.
So it has to be a horse,
Because you’re expecting a horse.
And that is why you’ll never find me.
Because I’m never the what you expect.
I’m the something better.

A terrifying demon dog who loves to torture humans. With a ridiculously cute name.

He’s a good boy really.
Just a soppy old thing,
Our Kluddle.
We thought, well, alright
This breed has a bad reputation.
But with careful rehabilitation
And a cute name
We’ll uncover his natural affection
And loyalty.
We’re pretty sure there’s affection and loyalty
Somewhere in there.

Of course, he’s a little scamp
Always up to mischief,
Our Kluddle.
He started shape-changing at six months
There we’d be, expecting his cute little fangy face at the door
And suddenly there’s a bat, a frog, a bear, a snake.
I nearly had a heart attack the first time.
Of course, he’s just playing
Doesn’t mean any harm.

Training is going… alright.
We’re pretty sure he’s trying really hard,
Our Kluddle.
But recall is still a bit of a challenge
And the other dog owners get twitchy
When we let him off the lead.
We’ve told them, he’s just being playful
Doesn’t know his own strength.
We’ve had to pay a lot of vet’s bills
And a few cremation fees.

Like all dogs, he can be a stubborn little sod
If he thinks walkies has finished too early
Our Kluddle.
His favourite trick is pretending he’s hurt his leg.
Refusing to move from the spot.
So we have to carry him home.
And then, you’ll laugh when you hear this
He makes himself heavier
And heavier
And heavier
And somehow, you can’t put him down.
You just have to keep going
With this terrible weight.
I tell myself
It’s just his way of saying
How much he enjoys cuddles.

Sometimes I think we’ve taken on too much.
Perhaps we should have adopted
A spaniel, or a golden retriever…
But we wouldn’t be without him now.
We know if we just try a bit harder
He’ll be a good dog one day.
We believe in him.
We know he doesn’t mean to hurt us.
Not really,
Not our Kluddle.

The trunk of a squirrel
The head of a hare
With a deer’s antlers somehow
Attached onto there.
The wings of a pheasant,
And little duck feet:
I’m the komischest creature
You’re likely to meet.

It has been alleged
(Though you’ll never confirm this)
That I was invented
By bored taxidermists
To sell to the tourists
Who come to Bavaria.
Nein! You can find me
Throughout that whole area!

I’m called Wolpertinger
And that’s not so bad,
Compared to the name
That I might well have had;
So when talking about me
Just count your good fortune:
At least you don’t have to say
“Hasenfasanhirschenteinhörnchen!”