I was laughing when I died,
picturing the face some future prince
might make when, having hacked
through giant rosebush thorns
and climbed the haunted tower,
he sees the spindle broken and the bed
unmade. We ran out at the last,
my virgin blood still wet between my thighs.
Let the spurned witch-sister
and the so-called fairy godmothers
duke out what history is writ.
Poor planning lets fate devour
the happy story here-and-now.
Destiny wants purity and light
and most of all submission, so
the scullery maid fisted me to ecstasy.
The curse broke like the chiming of a clock.
Time to grow up, unconcerned
by princess pink and bridal white. My passion
saved my life: city, apothecary's shop,
both a husband and a wife,
and grandchildren, bored, about my deathbed–
I would not have waited for a single man,
no matter what his charms,
for what I made with my two hands.