The Sealey Challenge Day 2! Every Poem a Potion, Every Song a Spell by Stephanie Parent

Every Poem A Potion, Every Song a Spell by Stephanie Parent

Querencia Press

In the forward, Parent explains that “all these poems contain something of me in them.” As a fellow fairy tale poet, I agree. The best poems use the pieces of us that explain why the fairy tale or myth could have been created. There are many warnings about forests and the dangers of men and wild beasts, but usually, as Parent has found, they are told to explain our fears and our strengths.

Many classical and semi-classical fairy tales were used. Each poem speaks to the fairy tale it is based from, but if a tale circles back, the reader is meant to explore a different angle.

I am a Beauty and the Beast fanatic and Parent’s “Clawed Creatures” hits me right where I like it—right at the not-quite true love/prince charming—but at the last stanza:

“Spring is coming,” he says in a voice

That sounds like icicles falling to the earth

 Shattering into shards

 And melting as the ground finally

 Thaws (30)

This is the moment we know there will be a happy ending but while it’s still delicious and new—not certain for the characters—and the most like our own stops and starts with any type of love.

I highly recommend this to any poetry of fairy tale lover!

Every Poem a Potion, Every Song a Spell by Stephanie Parent — Querencia Press