cynic.

And so they lived

happily ever after

and so did the neighbors and the chickens and the flowers that died before winter

and the children that were just born

and the young girls with eyes that saw the world

like a knotted present heavy in their soft hands

and it will come undone and lie open and ready

sweet to touch and soft to see

stretched out across their long legs

a panoramic view of paradise

and they all lived happily ever after

(each of them with their summertime lives and their long laughter and tight woven braids of fine gold hair and slender feet and great big glow around their delicate eyes and dirt and despair and princes in poverty who don't get poetry and grumble about the burnt bread and worn leather hands and year after year of long winter night and cold winter days and darkness in the corners of the dusty room)

and they all lived

and they all, they lived.

ever after

only comes once

upon a time.