Love in Hexasyllables XLVI: Market Day
She swims up to the shore
To see the human world
The day she turns fifteen,
Not realising then
That it is market day.
Excited by the throng,
She longs to walk and run,
To dance and pirouette
On feet and dainty toes,
Those funny little things!
A witch will buy her voice,
That much she knows for sure,
But a fishmonger's son
Is far too mean a prize
To pay so dear a price.
So once he learns of this,
Her insult he repays:
His father's knife he draws,
Her tail in half he hacks,
And off for sale it goes.
To see the human world
The day she turns fifteen,
Not realising then
That it is market day.
Excited by the throng,
She longs to walk and run,
To dance and pirouette
On feet and dainty toes,
Those funny little things!
A witch will buy her voice,
That much she knows for sure,
But a fishmonger's son
Is far too mean a prize
To pay so dear a price.
So once he learns of this,
Her insult he repays:
His father's knife he draws,
Her tail in half he hacks,
And off for sale it goes.