This poem is part of our 2016 fund drive bonus issue! Read more about Strange Horizons' funding model, or donate, here.
Content warning:
We changelings measure cost in plastic spoons
(for silver burns, and iron locks the joints
and no enchantment, pills, or fairy runes
can kill our pain for good). When we anoint
with scented balm, beware of lungs, ill-made,
that try to shift to gills or leaves, go tight
and wheeze their fight with air. For we have paid
the price of seeming mortal. Late at night
we'll wonder if our wish was worth the aches,
frustration, glassy-eyed fatigue; the meds,
the minds that struggle, stumble, make mistakes,
the fragile bodies, boring days in beds.
Each precious spoon of living has its price;
for fairy deals are sweet, but never nice.