1st Prize – 2024
Once Upon a Time – Gill Learner
I wasn’t after gold or emeralds. What I wanted
crooned like flutes in courtyards, lay in cisterns, cool
and sleek. Simoon-born sands which seep and stick
in folds of flesh had chafed too long: once his harem
was emptied, I let myself be wed, unveiled my body
gauze by gauze, went willingly to bed, stroked him
with henna’d hands. I was unafraid for I had bathed until
my skin was plumped like figs for our wedding feast.
But once he slept, I heard the far-off rasp of hone
on steel. Shrivelling, I waited for the call to prayer,
drips of fear between my shoulder-blades. He woke
and called me as a toddler cries for mother. Rocking
him I began to tell of a sailor shipwrecked on a whale,
who floats in a barrel, is pecked by a giant bird …
Before the trials were through he snored. He sent away
the executioner till he’d heard Sinbad safely home.
So began nightly narratives: Ali-Baba and his thieves,
the Key of Destiny, Ala-al-Din and a magic lamp, Delilah
whose tiny foot alone the diamond anklet fitted. Often
I was so worn with recitation that my words were stretched
with yawns; then this murderer would cradle me. But oh …
the days of bathing till my fingers rippled, the rubbing-in
of almond oil scented with sandalwood and rose, or
jasmine with neroli to keep my husband amorous.
Over five hundred nights of love and fantasy had passed
before all my tales were told. I sent my eunuch to the souk
where he sat with travellers, learned by heart new legends.
He brought me the adventures of Odysseus, sagas from
lands of ice and snow, the battle of Beowulf against
a monster, fables of stolen fire. The best were those
of river gods or of nymphs from watery depths who tempted
men with magic swords that reared up out of lakes.
Now while I watch my lord asleep, his black hair spread,
love bubbles in my veins for this sad king whose fear
I’ve seen. His tiger-golden eyes are restless under lids,
his brows pull inwards: tonight I confessed my yarns are done.
There is a story I might tell one day – the seed of which
is sown, will grow and grow – should he let me live.
Jackals howl, sand hisses at the shutters; my skin feels
blasted by the grains. If I must die, then let me drown.