A hawk-eyed wizard snapped her up
and plumped her in an ivory tower,
So she'd have time to till her brain
and make it tassel like a flower

The tower rose in an Orphic wood
where gold dust showered though knotted trees,
And faerie-antlered stags would strut
while pollen drifted on the breeze

And when he'd tired of all his tricks
the sorcerer would meet her there,
He'd steal beneath the carven tower
then shinny up her golden hair

But he was not the only man
who fell beneath Rapunzel's spell,
A lad who lived beyond the wood
would come to visit her as well
                      2
It pained the boy to see her trapped
This rara avis in her cage,
with such a sweet and youthful face
and yet so jaded for her age

It seemed whenever they conversed
she used some arcane Latin word,
Or lapidary axiom
the like of which he'd never heard

And when the girl would talk about
his Dionysian turpitude,
He'd wonder if he should rejoice
or if the girl was being rude

These men, you see,she'd tired of them
their lure, like gilt  would rub away,
And soon they'd start to irk her as
they clomped around with feet of clay

And though the lad beyond the wood
had picturesquely windswept hair,
She'd feel each time he came to call
as if a storm had broken there


So then one day she took a blade
as he was climbing to her room,
And cut right through her finespun locks
like threads of gold upon a loom

The poor boy tumbled down to earth
and whimpered for a little while,
As she just stood there in her tower
and fixed him with a twisted smile

                    3

Now, free again, she took her paints
of saffron, cinnabar and gold,
and made her jewel-bright manuscripts
like cloistered nuns from days of old

Her boudoir came to life once more
as gold-tailed sapphires stirred the air,
While orchids sprouted up the walls
and tigers sauntered everywhere

And later, when her books were shut
as day was blazing to a close,
Their essence hung there rich and sweet
as attar of the damask rose
            
                  Nox
But once the night-time fell and all,
except her creaking room,was still.
outside the mists were creeping in
that brought with them an eerie chill

Her covers now seemed winding sheets
beneath the opalescent moon
Or folds upon some effigy
supine atop a marble tomb

And then soft snowflakes came, and fell
like lilies on the sleeping wood,
and seemed to seep into her heart
for love had gone away for good

Rapunzel saw at once that she,
had missed these years the scented air
And wandered blinkered as a horse
through catacombs of dank despair

And so, as iif transfixed, beneath
the icy moon's hypnotic glow
She ****** herself down from her tower
and crashed upon the ice below
                  
Then gazing calmly at the stars
as life began to ebb away
she thought about the windswept boy
and knew they'd meet again one day




                      FINIS