Rapunzel Sonnets (Poem)

Sonnet I

Dreaming from my tower in the air

Higher than the trees surrounding close

Wondering if men would find me fair,

Footsteps down below break my repose

The mist about my window hinders me

From viewing who would enter in my court

But so few visitors I chance to see,

Intent I am on making my report

And tuning my sweet song towards the earth,

I'll change my fate, which left me here since birth.

Sonnet II

Six notes only had I sounded when

The footsteps came nearer my prison wall

Trembled I, yet sounded them again

And from what seemed the pit of earth heard call

A voice quite different from those I had heard

Though I could count that number on one hand

My lips too dry to speak a single word,

I wondered why I had not better planned

And tried in vain to step back from the sill

For something held my hair and kept me still.

Sonnet III

I tried to scream but sound I could not make

My frightened wit had robbed me of my speech

I thought of how my tresses I might break,

But spied the scissors just beyond my reach

Frantically I fumbled through my skirts,

Searching for my dagger in the fold

The same I used for tearing linen shirts

And as I knew not what of me had hold,

To sacrifice my braids I raised my knife

Too late! I now must kill to save my life.

Sonnet IV

My point directed at the stranger's chin,

No time was left for severing his rope

But shall I murder him or let him in?

I was too stunned at what I saw to hope

For some salvation. I knew I was lost

Whichever was my choice it mattered not

The mist had cleared, my innocence the cost

And for one endless moment I was wrought

Of human flesh and human cares and fears

The fantasy of fables read for years.

Sonnet V

A face it was, yea, had it lips and eyes,

But unlike that which greets me in the glass

In its twin orbs I saw no less surprise

And so we stood, two statues made of brass

I gazing in his eyes and he in mine

As though we might have read each other's thought

sHe smiled slowly as one drunk with wine

When suddenly the forest rang with shots

The hunters oft' before had come too near,

And so I bid adieu to all my fear.

Sonnet VI

Hardly knowing half of what I did

But well aware the half I knew was mad,

I grasped his arms as virtue may forbid

And pulled the creature with what strength I had

Into the chamber. To the floor we fell,

Then scrambled I to my poniard retrieve

And asked him now, at death's third door to tell

Why cam'st he hence, and bade him not deceive

For if he should be false, despite his beauty,

Though I be fooled, my dagger knew its duty.

Sonnet VII

His lips then moved but not a sound was heard

I saw them as two petals from a rose

When finally he was fit to say a word,

I was content examining his nose

He made some mention of a songbird's tune

I was not listening but o'erlooked his brow

He claimed he would have climbed up to the moon

I wished to give him peace but knew not how

He had not thought his rope a maiden's hair

Upon my life, I found the creature fair!

Sonnet VIII

The deed explained, he begged of me my name

"Rapunzel" I replied. "A man thou art?"

"I am" the creature laughed, "The very same

How long hast thou been kept from life apart?"

I told him how, for one and twenty years,

My home had been the walls he saw around me

How no amount of pleading, nor no tears

Have gained a visitor until he found me

But when I think upon it I recall,

For staring, he did not hear me at all.

Sonnet IX

It seemed to me we may as well not speak

His eyes had gone as cloudy as the day

He asked if he might come again that week

And I knew he must soon be gone away

He took my hands and pressed them in his own

As if by doing so he should stay longer

He told me of the world I might have known,

Vowing to return and slay my wronger

Then promising no harm, his head he bent

And kissed my lips, then out the sill he went.

Sonnet X

Lowering himself as he had come,

Through the mist my creature disappeared,

Riding back to all that he was from

And all that I could never be I feared

And yet what raven locks fell round his face

What gentle eyes as gray as seagulls wings

A voice so soft my words cannot replace

The memory of a thousand lovely things

And so I'll dream again of arms more sweet

The dagger I had dropped lies at my feet.