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She had always wanted
to sleep on a bed of moss. |
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She imagined how
the soft, green bedding
would feel silky
on her bare skin;
how it would press
and give beneath her weight
and support the contours of her body.
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When she awoke from her
dreams,
there was no softness or musty smell of earth,
no scent of growth or renewal. |
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For nearly 100 years she slept on a cold stone floor behind
iron gates.
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Through the rusty and withering bars of her prison, she
could see the moss lined steps of various buildings in the kingdom.
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She saw the green growing despite concrete and stones and
construction. It pushed into the light wherever there was dampness and shade and a little
water.
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The sight filled her with melancholy and she longed to
connect with another life form.
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In the summer,
the stones of her bed were warmed by sunlight. |
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Rays of comfort spilled from a solitary window which faced
every direction simultaneously.
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She could she the sun rising and setting, the cool calm of
twilight and the many stars which danced above.
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She was a spectator in all the carnivals and parades that
took place.
An observer, a watcher.
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During this period she ate only bananas, although she saw
the variety of fruit
that existed beyond her cell.
She saw children eating red shaped spheres.
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All of her meals fell from the trees that stood like
sentinels on either side of each step leading away from her cell. Like gifts, they fell
off the tree and tumbled towards her through the crack beneath the door.
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Although the bananas were tasty, and they
sustained her,
what she truly craved was flesh.
It was something she had a hunger for since birth.
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The monkey prince had placed her in the tower because he
loved her, although he hadn’t seen her in 90 years.
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There were no animals in the town, except him. She had
consumed them all voraciously. He refused to set her free as he feared her hunger.
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She was known to eat every part of a being.
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Toes, lids, ears...she was not particular about taste, it
all went down like silk, whether the meat was raw or drenched in sauce.
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She felt connected when she ate.
Foreign DNA mingling with her own.
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Lives ebbing and changing, merging to sustain and nourish
another.
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She had tried to explain this to the prince, but he was
deaf to her spirituality.
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Fear for his mortal life made his face blank, it made his
hands sweat, it caused him to put the one girl who made his heart sing into a grey cage.
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The monkey prince had been attentive during the first 10
years of her imprisonment.
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His days and nights were filled with thoughts of her, but
he kept his physical distance.
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He dared not set eyes on her directly, lest he become
enflamed with a passion that could only lead to his doom.
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In the dark of the night he would steal away to her window
and behold her sleeping reflection in the mirror within her cell, or gaze upon her shadow
as cast by the moon upon the floor.
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By day he sent his attendants to present her with fresh
flowers and enchanted gifts.
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Rings of gold, copper bangles, sapphires as blue as her
eyes,...
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...each gift crafted by an artisan from the Order of
Splendiferous Swamis of Ben so that it would sing, or tell the positions of stars,...
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...or show her the face of a God.
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Unfailingly she sent these back.
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She was hungry and angry and bored.
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She was lonely from the lack of kisses and although the
presents made her smile briefly with their enchantment,...
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...ultimately they represented her imprisonment and she
resented his attempts at distraction.
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She was locked in a cage!! Alone!
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With nothing but bananas and a mirror and a magnificent
view of the kingdom outside her window.
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The prince felt her energy, it came like red tidal waves
destroying the tiny villages in his heart.
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As time passed, the monkey prince grew weary of longing and
rejection, he began to rebuild with re-enforced steel and glass and deep moats.
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His secret nocturnal visits grew infrequent, and he ceased
to send gifts.
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He effectively sought diversions to put the sorry affair
out of his mind,...
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...and by the end of the century, the monkey prince had
taken 30 wives,...
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...fathered two hundred and eight daughters, one
hermaphrodite,...
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and a son named Denari. |
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