The Queen of Hearts

She had a feeling you’d come back one day.
Because of this, the male suitors that came to her door
Never seemed to measure up to the
Illusion that was you.

She waited for you to return,
Thinking about you almost continuously
Until one day the clouds cleared
And she finally saw the light.

She eventually rose from her window seat,
Turned her head away from her expectations,
And stopped watching for you to come back over
Those hills that you disappeared across.

She didn’t necessarily move on,
But she found other things to fill her time,
And as the infrequent letters piled on her doorstep
She found better things to read.

However, she had a feeling you’d come back one day.
But this time she was prepared.
She would smile her smile and speak amiably,
But she knew it was just a game.

This game, she found, was only enjoyable when won,
And this time around she would go undefeated.
The tables would turn and you would be her pawn
Because as time passed, she attained a new strategy.

That’s exactly what she did.
She played you to her Queen
And you happily succumbed
Thinking you held all the cards.

One by one the chips gathered on her side.
As she grew rich and you grew greedy,
Her face never gave way to the hand that she held
Because she knew you would eventually fold.

Which after a few rounds you did,
And you gave her everything you had.
As she pulled her earnings from across the table
She realized she had everything her former self had wanted.

But the treasure she so long sought after
Turned out only to be Fool’s Gold.
And with careful examination
It turned out to be worth nothing at all.

The Queen of Hearts respectfully bowed her head
As she showed you to the door.
Time, she discovered, had cruelly presented her with Jokers
But she would no longer settle for less than a King.

She shut the door and returned to the window
To watch you take your final march.
Soon you were gone and she returned to her table
And began to shuffle her deck of cards.

A Bedtime Chat

“Mother, this I know,” said the child, as his mother tucked him in his blue Astronaut sheets.

“What do you know, my child?” responded the mother with a beckoning grin.

“I know that the pipes that let out smoke from buildings are cloud makers,” he said.

The mother chuckled and brushed back his hair. “You silly boy. The smoke that comes from the factories is not clouds, but the exhaust from machines pumping away.”

“Oh. Well Mother, this I know,” retorted the child.

“What is it you know, my sweet?” smiled the mother.

“I know that there are tiny ants in stoplights that decide when to turn the color from red to green,” said the child proudly.

“Oh no, my dear. The color of the stoplights change from an electrical timer that senses when it is another cars turn to go.”

“Oh,” said the boy. “Well Mother, this I know.”

“What do you know, pumpkin?”

“I know that when we drive, the sun follows us around. I know this because I watch it and it is always right outside the window,” said the boy.

“No, no. The sun doesn’t follow you around, dear, it is merely so far away and so big that it only looks like it is following you.”

“Oh...Well Mother... This I know,” said the boy.

“Yes?” said the mother.

“I know that rain is really the sky crying,” the boy said.

“No, my child. Rain is when water gets stored up in the clouds so much that it overflows and falls down to the ground,” she said, and kissed him on the forehead.

The boy was very confused. “Huh...” he said with a frown. “I guess I don’t know much, do I mother?”

At this point the mother realized what she had done. “Oh no, my sweet,” she responded with a pat on his head. “You know so, so much.”

“Like what?”

“Well, you know how to tie your shoes!”

“Yeah, but so do all the kids in daycare,” he said.

“You know how to count to a hundred!”

“Everybody knows that...”

The mother sighed. “My dear boy, let me tell you this. There will be time when people tell you you’re wrong. They will tell you what’s right and try to set you straight. You will be told ‘no’ so many times in your life, that you will begin to think it’s the only answer. There will be times when you think you know nothing at all. But you, my child, will always stand up, look them in the eye, and say ‘That’s not how I see it!’ and go on with your day.”

The boy smiled and the mother smiled.

“So, when I tell you that the pipes are not cloud makers, that ants don’t turn stoplights from red to green, that the sun does not follow you around, and that the sky doesn’t cry when it rains, I want you to look up at me and say ‘That’s not how I see it’, okay?”

“Okay,” smiled the boy. “I love you, Mom.”

The mother kissed the boy again and re-tucked the cover underneath his chin. “I love you, too, son. More than you know,” she whispered as she made her way to the door.

“Mother?” he asked as the door creaked closed.

“Yes, my child?”

The boy grinned. “That’s not how I see it,” he said. “This I definitely know.”

The mother smiled and closed the door.

A Tale for the Wise

The saying that our lady searched high and low for love
Is an understatement.
She searched the world, always looking for the fireworks,
The swelling music, and the chirping of the birds.
She searched so often that she hardly spent a night at home,
But she was always met with nothing but disappointment.

What our woman, who traveled so often, did not realize,
Was that while she searched for her warrior, her huntsman, her soldier,
The farm boy out yonder gathering cattle and shoveling manure
Was truly, deeply, desperately, everlastingly, and unconditionally in love with her.

He had no badges or medals of honor to prove his worth,
But he had the love in his eyes, the respect in his voice, and the honesty in his touch.
He was not made of gold or of coins to provide a comfortable throne,
But he had the reputation of yesterday, the evidence of today, and the promise of tomorrow.
But, to our dismay and to his broken heart, she searched on.
Unaware and unsatisfied.

She searched the enchanted forest to no avail.
She sailed seas to meet only the next shore.
She kissed frogs and drunkards in hopes she’d break the spell
Of her uncaptured, lonely heart,
In hopes that she would somehow end her search for true loves kiss.

After every disappointing departure of our lady,
The silent but overflowing heart of our lad weakened once more.
She remained unaware as he put on a smile and bid her adieu,
Wishing her luck in finding what she was looking for,
Knowing that she was exactly what he needed.

Years passed, and nothing changed but the youth in our strangers.
Her eyes grew tired and his heart grew weak,
As she strained the blues of her eyes,
Peering over foreign mountains looking for happily ever after,
And he further distressed his aching heart
as her frequent departures tugged at its stings.

Perhaps it was the sickness of a broken heart
That sent our aging man into a bed of delusion -- unable to eat or stand.
Out of good will, our lady extended the hand of an old friend
and attempted to nurse our gentleman back to health.

Many bowls of soup passed time between the two,
Who until now had spoken only greetings and goodbyes.
It was only one night when our fragile man was talking in his sleep,
Did he utter the words, “I love you.”

Our lady, knitting in her neighboring rocker, froze mid stitch,
and asked the sleeping man to repeat what he said.
He replied:
“Day or night, my lady. Near or far, my beauty.
Wherever your travels may lead you,
You have my heart in your pocket.”

With this, the yarn met the ground as our lady crossed to the sickbed.
And she put her wrinkled hand on his wrinkled cheek,
And she looked upon his pale face,
And she closed her tired eyes,
And thought back to the time she had wasted
Looking for what was in her back yard.

She gently kissed the forehead of the mumbling man,
And crossed back to her knitting.
She sighed a breath of deep relief in knowing that,
After all the years of travel,
After all the pain of being alone,
After all the heartache of kissing faceless souls,
The gold of her heart had not gone unnoticed.

A few more days passed before our man sat up in bed,
Where he was greeted with a hand on his chest
Of the neighboring beauty who grew wise to his secret.
She smiled sweetly and brushed back his silver hair,
And together, without words, they knew their story had begun.

Love brought them many happy years,
Living in their quiet cottage together.
But it would be a fallacy to say that things would stay this way forever.
For as every life has an abrupt beginning, it also has an untimely end.

Though the heart of the old man was filled with the love of his wife,
It did not replace the weakness of his valves
When one day, while gathering the grain,
He fell to the ground and was met with the tears of his
Frightened wife.

He put his hand on her wet cheek and smiled through his beard,
and she leaned forward and kissed him more truly and passionately
Than she had ever thought possible.
He whispered goodbye, for he thought it was the end,
And she shook her head and put her hand to his heart
And said:
““Day or night, my husband. Near or far, my love.
Wherever your travels may lead you,
You have my heart in your pocket.”

He smiled and she smiled,
As they lay in the grass together.
Soon her husband was gone, but she stayed there still,
Finding only comfort next to him.
Finally, she looked up at the star that she had not wished on in years,
and made one final wish.

She closed her eyes, and they would not open again,
As she went to travel with her husband
through enchanted forests and over seas,
Wherever the wind would guide them, they journeyed together.
For true love stories never really end.