Guest Post by Mindi Meltz: The Ever After Ever Trilogy

Here’s an invocation by the Wicked Witch in Mindi Meltz's After Ever After trilogy, a fairy tale of real relationship beyond the "happily ever after" union where most love stories end. Cinderella must overcome childhood self-denial to become queen and stand equal with her husband. Sleeping Beauty wakes to find her primeval land and matriarchal people destroyed—but her forgotten, hundred-year dream of love’s surrender holds the key to renewal. Belle yearns secretly for the Beast who inspired her passion before he turned back into a man, reflecting her own animal yearnings in a ghostly land. Snow White, raised in mythic wilderness by demigods of old, must recognize her own human self in that magic mirror, to finally take in and transform by the love of the huntsman. Discovering each other across mountain and dream, through ritual and longing, by war and friendship, these four familiar princesses evolve into real women across three epic tales. And that “wicked” Dark Faerie keeps luring them deeper into the forbidden, shadowy, feminine magic threading each of their clashing cultures—the lost rage, tenderness, sensuality, compassion, community and natural aliveness of the divine feminine—until they claim, not by battle but by intimacy, the true sovereign power to heal their broken worlds.

Book 2 was just released in July, Book 3 to be released early next year. Read more at www.mindimeltz.com.

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Snow White hid in a mirror reflected. 

Cinderella danced at the ball undetected.

No one knows Sleeping Beauty’s dream.

Beauty loved Beast, but was she what she seemed?

They woke by kisses; they changed rags to riches; 

They defeated the curse of those dark faerie-witches.

But was it a curse? Did you ever ask her?

Did they really live happily all the while after?

Who were those princes, and how did it feel

to wake a hundred years later, your old life not real?

One fairy tale ended, but another began:

You married a beast, but must live with the man.

Who sent you blind, into love, to be “princess”? 

Who wrote love stories that ended in conquest?

You already know the tales told by men. 

I tell the tale that comes after the end.

I, witch of old, tell the story of she

whose lands are not symbols: they birth us, they breathe.Snow White, Beauty, Cinderella—

My curses were gifts, and at last I will tell you.

I call on the wolf, the sea, the winds.

I call on your memory, I call on the Grimms.

I call in the maidens, the mothers, the crones, 

the forest, the fields where you played all alone.

I call in jealousy, changes, new tears, 

the sacrifice and the long marriage years.

I call in wild-men, huntsmen, dwarves

slain by the heart and not by the sword.

I call in the waking, the crown and the blessing. 

I call in all of the things you were wishing

when you pricked your finger, or stole the rose, 

when you prayed at the grave your mother knows.

How will you be strong, and what does it mean 

to rule a world, to be princess—or queen?

Now you’re a wife, but you’re looking thin. 

So bite the apple. Let me back in.

— the Dark Faerie Queen

Mythical Novels and Animal Wisdom

www.mindimeltz.com

 

Being Wise Twenty-Nine

 My books, The Sands of Gower and Haw, in Kostroma, Russia Library

Being Wise Twenty-Nine   August 22, 2021

Leaves reaching, inside the window,

outside, too. Around me paintings,

mostly Russian, those loved people.

Then papers and books everywhere:

under my desk, in drawers of filing

cabinets, in boxes taking up half

the room, or more. All the words I’ve

written and will leave behind me.

These last books are my best, I think.

One at a time, I’ve published twenty-

eight books. In coming years, thirty-

one. Then I’ll rest my case. All the

human stories I’ve told, the battles

I’ve described; the endings I’ve

imagined and made real. All the

people who’ve helped me, and those

I’ve helped. What else is our human

life for? If we help each other on earth,

we’ll help each other in heaven. Who

we are won’t ever be lost. Even as our

light dims, it won’t disappear.

Being Wise Twenty-Eight

     Sunrise on New Year's day by Doc Ellen at Jordan Lake,                 Moncure, N.C.

Being Wise Twenty-Eight August 15, 2021

Most mornings I awake at dark

and wait for light. First light is

grey, barely visible. Then faint

tree shadows slowly taking on

substance because something

is glowing, off to one side. This

window looks west. If I turned

and looked east. I could see more–

a real flowering of light as the

clock moves past six. Even now

we head toward winter. They’ve

promised rain for a week. It began

last night, and Tim brought the

clothes in. Definitely trees now,

and sky behind them. A few

branches right outside this window,

still bearing green leaves. Maybe

the end of our 90-degree days. 

Maybe not. With our climate

changing, it’s hard to tell.  We’ve

had more than our usual rain

and high humidity. The sky begins

to turn blue. The rooster crows.

It’s not raining now. Light enters

from outside as well as from the

lamps. I see the single leaf shapes.

The rooster sounds happy, even

celebratory. The computer is dark,

because we had a storm last night,

and I turned it off early. Now it is

full light even though the sun is

still beyond the trees but waking

to keep me company and turning

sky pale blue with pink.

Being Wise Twenty-Seven

photo of my Grandmother Grace with gladiolas in Norman, OK.

Being Wise Twenty-Seven August 8, 2021

My aging body is doing well, 

all considered, but when my feet

hurt, it slows me way down. I

forget to do my exercises. It

doesn’t take much. A sharp

toenail. If I’m reading a good

book, I almost forget the pain,

but it never quite goes away. I

have to act on behalf of my

feet. Mostly though I pass through

my days with very little pain.

When I took off my shoes,

the pain eased. I have three

helpers, sometimes more. When

I have to ask help, I try to give

them advance notice and choices.

“If you would pick the okra,

I’d be so grateful.” He didn’t

want to, but he did. My life is

very limited, yet I still publish

books and teach classes. But

I can easily forget what day it is

and have to stop and think:

“Today is Sunday, poem day.

Write about the way it is now.

Then there will be a record

in case I forget.”

 

Being Wise Twenty-Six

 Blue Grosbeak at Jordan Lake Dam. Photo by Doc Ellen

Being Wise Twenty-Six August 1, 2021

It takes courage not to worry

when your brain has little bleeds.

Where will it end, and when?

No one knows. I take the pill

every day and carry hot tea

without a spill. I sometimes

knock things off. Dishes

accumulate. I bury myself in

good books. In the midst of a

fire scene when a wrecked

helicopter explodes, the smoke

alarm goes off. Tim toasted

his bread twice with that result.

He knew it would but couldn’t

resist. I jump. The book’s fire

is real to me. In the book,

problems are solved. Mine I

have to live with. Right now

I’m not in pain. Sometimes I

can’t sleep when I want to,

and many times I sleep when

I’m trying to stay awake. It’s

part of aging, yes. I’m living

longer than most people. I’m

being cared for in ways I never

expected. Life ends by being

mysterious and gracious, not

to mention unpredictable.

Being Wise Twenty-Five

     Three pink cosmos blooms and a bud. Janet Wyatt 2020

Being Wise Twenty-Five July 25, 2021

Reading, reading. Human error. We

make so many. Around me, but at a

distance, desperate people are dying.

Our Covid returns, full force and

worse. I have my own disease and its

medicine. No more numbness, but I

forget more. I’m writing notes now

in my diary to keep track. I still write

poetry. I still make supper. I start the

wash. I make the grocery list. Two 

women say to call them if I need 

someone, if I fall and can’t get up. 

Two others come to help. Tim carries

my dishes after meals. I sometimes

drop my fork or knife. I begin to have

my real old age. Memory lapses, but

so far I catch and correct them. I

publish new poems on my blog. My

voice is quieter than once.. I let

others carry my activist burden. I’ll

observe and write. Let the poems do

more work. I’ll keep reading human

history, suffer human error. I’ve done

my share of loving, and I’ve been

loved, too passionately for it to last.

And yet it lasted. I’m satisfied. What

I felt those years, albeit the poems,

stays and stays, will never be lost. I’ve

suffered, yet known ecstatic heights.

One word is sometimes enough.

Being Wise Twenty-Four

Members of Chatham Citizens Against Coal Ash Dump celebrating a legal win in 2017. Final legal win in December 2020. By then we'd lost Johnsie Tipton, first on left, and John Cross, third on right, and Terica Luxton, not shown, to cancer.

Being Wise Twenty-Four July 18, 2021

Right now, in the wider world,

Hate thrives, our pandemic is

still alive and flourishing. Racism

rears its ugly head again, again!

All the tenets of democracy are

under attack. What happened

to the Bill of Rights and our

Constitution? Our Declaration

of Independence? We moved

from that beginning: our forefathers

first, and finally everyone; the

eighteen-year-olds, the former

slaves, the native nations, women,

and all white men achieved the

vote. Now white men, their

power threatened, try to take

our votes away. Shame, shame!

All our great religions urge us

to treat others as we would be

treated. As children we learn

to help each other. Kindness

wins friends. A helping hand

reveals the true value of our

fellows. Our Earth Itself suffers

from our carelessness, our greed.

We’re not being wise. We’re being

foolish. Will rainstorms, drought,

hurricanes, tornadoes, sea surges

teach us to be wiser? When roofs

are blown off or our temperature

rises beyond what we need to

live, will we listen and begin

to pay attention?