And I am calling for the King and Queen
my wicked mother drove away
when I was just a boy.

My King, who was a light of honor,
truth and purity, a fountain of excitement
and desire.

And my Queen, whose radiance
was round and bright and fuller than the moon,
whose heart was red and innocent

and so magnificent when she was taken out,
like young Snow White, into the forest
to be killed.

I called her Mary in my boyhood,
called her in my dreams.
I called her Mary — Mary

I would cry out. Mary, Mary!
I am broken in my heart
and lonely.

In the quiet of my boyhood night
I’d often see my good King
shooting arrows true and straight — yes

I didn’t know the King had gone away
to save himself— an exile
in the underworld.

Meanwhile, the shadow woman
kept up her manipulations — changing
clothes and faces, even names

—and raped the naïve stand-in boy again,
again, again. It was a dark, dark time.
And most of me forgot about the Queen.

But darkness isn’t permanent.
And when the good earth finally turned
enough to make the waiting meadows visible

in all their love and lush and fertile warmth,
the boy found strength enough
to kill the evil one — and then rejoice.