Deborah Bacharach
Cinderella: Problem Solver
I’ve never been a horse apple. But,
the woodbox is empty, the axe dull,
the forest dark. The tips of the sisters’ fat toes
have fallen bone white.
They scream.
There’s got to be something
to hold the heat.
Something to burn.
The Fairy Godmother: Scouting Report on Cinderella
Frankly, she’d wed a volcano
to get out that house.
She’s the kind of girl
who doesn’t know the difference
between love and lava.
They both burn, right? They both rip
off your skin. She reads
romance in the outhouse.
Cinderella: At the Ball
Have you ever watched a trombone pull back,
then blast your grief?
All the debris
attacked with joy.
Under the king’s long banquet cloths, I catch
the pink nose of a mouse.
I don’t care if it’s before or after midnight.
I am not moonshine.
The Prince: At the Ball
If I were braver,
I could leave
my father’s castle,
his rules.
I could take my beating
heart.
Cinderella: After the Ball
I know all the reasons I should not
drop my apron from my face,
approach him. But my body.
At dawn, I reach into straw, warm
from the hens, their plump softness.
My hand pulls out opals.
The Prince: I Tell Her the Truth
I’m important.
I don’t want to rule. I don’t care if I rule now.
When girls rush the stage, I clench
my dark and hidden parts. I don’t say
the wrong thing. I expect
any sons I have to suffer.
Cinderella: To My Dead Mother
My gut closes like a flue.
I spend my days in the not-sighing,
the not-singing,
the susurration of ashes.
Allow me one thing on this path
of jagged rocks—the power of my body,
an immeasurable universe,
a memory for a blessing.
Deborah Bacharach is the author of Shake & Tremor (Grayson Books, 2021) and After I Stop Lying (Cherry Grove Collections, 2015). Her work has been published in Poetry Ireland Review, New Letters and Poet Lore among others. She is a reader for SWIMM and Whale Road Review. Find out more about her at DeborahBacharach.com.