The Rumpelstiltskin Retellings: A Series of Poetic Blogs
by Keyan Bowes
Miller’s Girl Speaks.oldmillrace.com
The fairy-tale never mentions my name –
A perfect reflection of my role.
I am the Miller’s Daughter, then the Queen.
I never chose to be either.
When the two men, my father and the king
Played out their game of chicken,
No one seemed to care that it was *my* life
That was on the line.
I wonder why he didn’t threaten my father,
When he led me into the room and said, “Now spin!”
Anyway, there in that bare
Closet of a room, that little man
Was my only hope.
I gave him my woman-things, the first two nights
My ring, I mean, and my necklace.
On the third night, having no more jewelry to give,
I thought his demand
Was for the third woman-thing, so I said yes
Before he asked it.
R.S.Skin.hiddenblog.com
(Rumpelstiltskin)
The grotesque little man of legend
Is me, you know. But no one tells
What I thought.
Playing around the palace
Where my human father sometimes
Suspected my presence, I came upon her.
It was the first time,
Since my magic mother vanished, leaving me,
A woman was in that room.
You know I would have helped her anyway.
The myth blames me, but who
Else was on her side in that bare room?
Her braggart father?
Her murderous future groom?
In honor, I did not make a beggar of her.
I took what she could give for the gold I spun.
I only sought what neither life nor magic gave me,
My son.
Miller’s Girl Speaks.oldmillrace.com
So it’s not true that all men want
Just one thing, any more than it is true of women
(Who must be content with whatever they can get).
The king my husband wanted gold,
My father wanted to impress him.
The strange elf did not ask for sex,
But asked instead for my first-born.
I was, let me say, relieved.
From today’s perspective, I must justify it.
Here’s how it was, not all that tough to understand.
First, it postponed the issue (no pun intended)
Of how to compensate the magic man.
Though I was set to offer him my body, it
Was a last resort I’d be happy not to use;
And of course I knew if I did not agree,
It would mean death. At just sixteen, that’s
pretty hard to take.
Finally I thought (remember thinking)
How different is it, then, from giving up
A kitten from a litter, or a pup?
Especially *this* king’s son.
King.castleblog.com
(His Majesty,
By the Grace of God, King of the Realm)
I thought I knew that braggart fool was lying.
I thought I’d catch him out and give him back
His daughter dead. (I didn’t need the gold.
It’s still lying around somewhere.)
Well, the joke’s on me, but see how well I handled it.
The third time she spun the straw to gold,
I knew I had to safeguard that miraculous power
From other men, who could use the endless wealth
To challenge me.
Of course I did have other options.
I could have had her thrown in jail,
Or even put to death as I had threatened.
But why? And who knows what the risk might be?
One shouldn’t play with magic,
As I’ve learned.
She was no princess, that’s true.
But men have always known since time began,
The safest way to guard a woman is to marry her.
TheMillerHimself.oldmillrace.com
Well, that came out all right!
Though I thought for a few days there I’d really gone and done it.
What was the king so harsh for?
It was just a harmless brag,
And he could have laughed it off
as the kind of nonsense small men talk
When suddenly they find themselves before the King.
But now, I wonder, when I found myself
Saying my lassie could spin gold from straw
Did I know something I didn’t know I knew?
I must have.
Something made me say it,
And now look, she’s Queen!
Miller’s Girl Speaks.oldmillrace.com
Oh yes, I married him.
He married me, and even if I could
Have chosen to refuse him, I would not.
I’m not stupid.
What other future did I have?
At best a farm-wife, with some man,
Hopefully kindly, for my husband.
And always in the shadow
Of the King’s belief
In my golden straw.
Who knows? If it got out, maybe
Someone would want to burn me for a witch.
Miller’s daughters don’t turn kings down.
I didn’t this one, though I did not forget
(As he promptly did) that he had said,
“Or else you die.”
King.castleblog.com
(His Majesty,
By the Grace of God, King of the Realm)
It was a courageous choice.
Not every prince would take a miller’s offspring
For his queen. A good choice.
She’s comely,
Not overly reserved in bed, like some,
But expects to do what she is told.
Maybe she’ll bear an heir.
Unlike those others. There’s something to her.
It’s true she has no political connections,
But those can be more trouble than they’re worth.
She doesn’t plague me with ambitious uncles,
And even my good father-in-law
Soon understood he could not be familiar.
So if she is no princess of the blood,
Who dares question me when I
Have dignified her with this marriage?
Queen.castleblog.com
(Her Majesty)
That’s me, the Miller’s Daughter.
New clothes, new handle, new life.
I can’t say it’s any worse than the dull old one, either.
I do my needlework as diligently
As I used to mind the mill.
Of course I miss my friends.
But that’s growing up and getting married.
That’s why they always cry at weddings,
Whether you go to the next town
Or the next palace.
I’m a good wife.
I do as I am told.
The senior ladies manage the palace,
And they do it well, with long practice,
At doing for a bachelor king.
I don’t interfere.
I don’t pull rank.
The King has not noticed anything different
Since I came to be his wife,
Because there isn’t.
He demands his rights
From time to time.
Which man wouldn’t?
Only in my dreams,
(Which I tell no one)
I recall the little man who
Didn’t take that third woman-thing
I would have offered,
And in my dream
He does.
I wish I had someone to talk to,
But not the King. My side
Of every conversation goes, Yes, Sire.
HandMaiden.castleblog.com
Handmaiden to Her Majesty the Queen
and Nurse to His Royal Highness the Crown Prince
Poor thing. Maybe I was the only one
Who truly loved her, till the baby came.
I know she is the Queen, but then she came
From the village next to mine,
And though we were not girls together,
We might have been.
Who talks of lonely?
The king
Always did the right thing by her,
He doesn’t stint her for anything
But his company, and that she doesn’t mind
Once he gave her the son.
Queen.castleblog.com
(Her Majesty)
Well, stupid me. Any of you out there
Who are mothers or even fathers
Could have told me, I suppose.
I touched my cheek to his soft little one
And drowned in love.
The king my husband came
And looked down proudly at his son.
He issued the usual proclamations,
And the ladies arranged the usual
Ceremonies.
There we were, baby and I,
In our sacred dyad.
Baby opened his bright eyes,
Caught my gaze, and cycled his arms and legs.
In the corner of the room I saw
The little dwarf who saved my life
And asked my child.
The logic of the queen’s chamber
Was quite as clear as that of the bare room.
If the choice was between my life and child,
Why, he could have my life, of course.
How could I have known then
What kind of love this is?
If I had known, the choice of death
Would have been as simple then as now.
Also, then, I hadn’t understood
How a cradle empty of the king’s heir
Would cause a ruckus…
It’s not the same thing as the miller’s grandson.
R.S.Skin.hiddenblog.com
(Rumpelstiltskin)
How do I explain the desperate game
Of guessing at my name
That I foisted on her? It’s tough to justify.
It was not with sadistic intent,
Though I know it looks that way.
I found her more distraught
Than I had thought.
Perhaps I hoped
That three days of trying
Would give her time
To get used to it.
I already loved the baby
Who looked at me and smiled
And waved his arms
As though he knew me.
Indeed, I could have offered him
Something more than the king our father.
Immortality.
Was my mother such a one?
Did she despair to leave her son?
HandMaiden.castleblog.com
Handmaiden to Her Majesty the Queen
and Nurse to His Royal Highness the Crown Prince
As soon as she told her story,
Naturally I would have done anything to help.
Anything at all. I saw how she worried,
How close she was to suicide.
She kept demanding lists of names,
And I got them for her. But I knew
That was foolish, just the kind of blind logic
That comes from panic.
The only way, I knew, would be to get it
From the little man himself,
And I knew that I must follow him
Engaging him, perhaps, in conversation.
It’s just as well that I am inconspicuous,
And I can walk so quiet in the woods.
For when I came upon his campfire
In his forest home,
I heard his name,
And hurried back with the means to save her.
R.S.Skin.hiddenblog.com
(Rumpelstiltskin)
My magic mother would have thought it right.
The clumsy, loyal woman
Clumped through the woods after me
Sounding like a herd of elk.
I knew what she was after,
And when I did,
I knew that she should have it.
I played out the charade,
I returned to the palace,
My home and hers,
I stamped my feet in anger,
And disappeared.
Baby laughed.
HandMaiden.castleblog.com
Handmaiden to Her Majesty the Queen
and Nurse to His Royal Highness the Crown Prince
She tells and retells this tale,
Though never to the King,
Her terror bleeding through the years,
And so she’ll exorcise it:
That odd and dangerous little man.
My heroic walk through midnight woods
To save the child.
Prince.castleblog.com
(His Royal Highness the Crown Prince)
My mother told me the story
Of Rumpelstiltskin and me;
And Nursie’s quest.
She’s still scared.
When I was little, she didn’t
Tell me for fear of nightmares.
Rumpy and I
Giggle about it
As we play hide and seek
Around the spinning wheel and sheaves of gold
In our secret room under the palace.
(Sometimes I call him Dada
And he looks pleased.)