from the precipice since 2017
The Dawn & Snow White’s Mother
Khaya “Khalypso” Osborne
as the story goes
Snow White's mother was
of a healthy coloration before she
stole away in the dead of labor.
i reckon she could have been myriad hues really.
perhaps she was like the pliant skin of a blackberry—
camouflage for the moonlight's secrets and,
when stuck or bursting, she seeped with an ink
as unpredictable as
the brittle crunch a child witnesses when
they snuff out the life of a housefly between a moist, innocent palm
for the first time.
or,
maybe
her mother was a flayed sunrise gold,
complete with pink cheeks & a fleeting
shimmer—the kind of beauty daylight is jealous of & will not tolerate.
whatever she was,
it dissipated into the air the moment she became with child.
as susceptible to the laws of tragedy as any other mother, she owed the universe a dowry for the upturned impossibility that was her child. the light peeked over the mountaintops and said,
"so, you want to be a mother? give me something, your best anything, in return"
this explains why she brings a delicate red-lipped, ivory thing
screeching into the face of the dawn & carries herself off with the dewdrops
mere hours later.
a woman goes nowhere without her color.
and, like any good fairytale,
we never know the mother's name;
only what she leaves in her wake,
only what she decides is unworthy
of carrying into the cosmos.
Khalypso is an 18 year old poet and actress from Sacramento, CA. Their work is available or forthcoming from Calamus Journal, Crab Fat Magazine, Black Napkin Press, and Rising Phoenix Review, as well as several other places. They are a poetry editor for Cerurove Magazine, Culaccino Magazine and the Social Media Manager of Black Napkin Press. They were born in Berkeley, California, lived briefly in Richmond, spent most of their life in Sacramento and currently reside in Elk Grove.