Once upon a time,
(when most things happen),
a small country queen gave life
to the boy Riquet.
Ugly and strange,
stooped and crooked,
a tiny tuft of hair atop his uneven pate,
more troll than human,
people gasped,
children stared,
dogs sniffed,
suspicious of the boy Riquet.
But never a child is born
without the faerie folk to attend.
The sprite who stood for Riquet's birth
hovered over the lad's cradle
and smiled.
"Never fear,
friend Queen.
Ugly is your son;
he will be the most clever boy
in the world.
And this we give him -
whom he loves
will be blessed
with wisdom equal to his own.
Call him Riquet with the Tuft
and celebrate his life."
And so she did.
In another small kingdom,
another queen,
(who shooed away the fairies)
gave birth to another child,
a daughter named Miranda.
Not till too late,
did the Queen learn her sorry plight -
Miranda
lovely as a summer day,
as foolish as beautiful.
The queen pled the faeries for help,
though it past time for fairie magick
to plant Wisdom.
"Instead,"
sang a sprite,
"we give her this:
whom she loves
shall have beauty."
And so time passed.
Riquet was an ugly baby,
and then an ugly boy,
whom everyone liked -
once they recovered from first sight.
People came from anywhere
that knew his name,
bringing gifts
in exchange for thought.
Riquet never lacked companions,
and gifted with wisdom,
he knew how to choose and keep
friends good and true.
One day
to this pleasant scene,
(as it always must)
came a visiting merchant
offering Riquet a princess portrait
for words of wisdom.
The merchant learned a lesson
about disappointment,
for Riquet saw the picture
and thought of nothing else.
If there be love at first sight,
this was it.
"Who is she?
I've never seen her before
but I've yearned for her all my life."
Disappointed or no,
Riquet was a prince,
so the merchant pointed him
towards the portrait princess.
Meanwhile,
Miranda grew more foolish.
People who didn't know better asked questions -
she stammered,
she blushed,
she finally said something
that confused everyone,
including herself,
her words so silly
people fled the room when she entered,
afraid to laugh
in the face of a princess.
No end to her beauty,
Miranda was lonely.
She rarely spoke,
never went in public,
kept herself
to herself.
But she was not so foolish
she did not feel her loneliness.
At last,
despairing to find anyone who wanted her,
in even her own home,
she set off to the woods,
praying to find a friend
somewhere in the world.
No one saw her go
or missed her.
Before the day was out,
(as you knew would happen)
Miranda came upon Riquet,
who was searching for the princess of the portrait.
She slipped through the trees like a faerie vision
and he like twisted and tufted troll nightmare
and they stepped into a clearing in the oaks.
When he saw Miranda, he -
well, first the prince stood in silent and dreamy shock -
then he caught his breath and spoke.
"I am Riquet with the Tuft.
I have travelled far in search of you,
my princess."
Miranda thought of little to say,
and was afraid to say that.
She blurted out,
"Hello!"
and felt a fool.
This exhausted her stock of appropriate words
and she fell silent.
The two stood there for some minutes,
Riquet lost in the beauty of the princess,
Miranda confused,
scared that this person would disappear
like everyone at home.
A shimmering tear trickled from her eye.
"You're so sad,"
said Riquet in wonder,
watching the crystal teardrop slip down her cheek.
"I cannot imagine
what could make someone so lovely
so sad."
"Lovely!"
Miranda's tears poured.
"I am so tired
being lovely
and lonely.
Oh, sir,
if only I could be clever,
if only I could have
a friend, or just
some one I can talk to.
I would give all this loveliness people speak of
if only
I did not have to be lonely."
Riquet moved closer.
"Lady,
there is no greater proof of wisdom
than the belief that one is not clever.
The more sense one has,
the more one knows how much more there is to learn."
That
confused poor Miranda.
She peered through tears,
confusion writ large in her bright brown eyes.
Riquet's poor heart nearly burst
with tenderness
and care
he had never felt before.
Miranda sobbed,
"I know
I am foolish,
my foolishness makes me sad.
But I do not know
what to do
about my foolishness
or my sadness."
Riquet smiled.
He knew
the cure for this problem.
"I can help you.
I have the power
to make you
the wisest lady in the world."
"Oh, do!
Please!" Miranda begged through the tears.
"Right now?!
Please!?"
"Marry me," said Riquet.
Now Miranda was more than puzzled,
"Marry you?"
and the tears took a break.
"My lady,
I would be the happiest creature that lives
if you marry me
a year from today."
"I will!"
shouted Miranda,
for besides being foolish,
she had no patience at all.
She did not understand
what Riquet meant
or why marrying him made any difference,
but if that was the cost of wisdom...
well....
"I'll marry you a year from today!"
Riquet smiled,
crowed,
sighed,
nearly faint from joy at her answer.
"And now,
now you must sit
and tell me of yourself.
Tell me of being beautiful
and lonely."
Afraid her answer was a mistake before she even spoke,
Miranda sat beside him.
She mumbled and bumbled and stumbled over her words,
and was ready to go back to her silence,
but Riquet with the Tuft waited,
homely and patient,
for her to gather her thoughts.
She spoke most of the afternoon and evening,
spoke of the pleasures of beauty
and the pain of foolishness
and of time
and tenderness,
and when she saw that Riquet did not leave or laugh,
the words came freer and easier.
Miranda felt different,
different from anything she had ever felt before.
Open-mouthed, Riquet was amazed
by her insight.
To watch her speak was enough -
the sparkle and flash in her eyes
when she described a loveliness,
the twitch of muscles in her neck
when she disapproved,
how her hands carved an expression from the air
that Riquet could never have put in words.
And her words!
For all Riquet's wisdom,
she told him things he had never known,
never thought.
Listening to her made him wiser,
answering her questions forced him think clearer.
The prince lost sense of time and place
and wanted nothing more from life
than this evening to be forever.
Miranda surprised herself.
Such wisdom
tumbling,
escaping her lips.
But then,
no one listened before,
certainly not as this malformed creature beside her.
Talked herself empty for the evening,
seeing it was late,
Miranda wanted to return home.
"I shall see you a year from today."
She gave him a smile that swelled and melted his heart,
then Miranda stepped lightly back to her palace,
briskly rubbing her face to remove
pale or pink traces
of an afternoon crying,
though no one knew she'd been gone.
Each day for a year,
Miranda charmed and amazed the court
with her wit.
Many the topic on which she had an opinion,
but clever enough to know many topics
with no need of her views.
News of her brilliance
spread beyond the borders of her own small kingdom,
princes came from any-everywhere to meet the lovely
clever princess.
Each princeling swooned
at her wit,
her wisdom,
her insight,
the poetry of her speech,
her unmatched beauty.
Each princeling begged her
marry him.
Each princeling
was refused.
Miranda had a new problem
the wiser one becomes,
the more complex becomes the world.
Miranda now thought this way
and that about most things.
The princes who would marry her
were handsome, yes,
and rich and powerful,
of course.
But she did not love any of them,
didn't even like most of them,
she told them one and all
she needed time
to think her thoughts
and plan her plans.
Miranda had forgotten
her promise to marry Riquet.
She gave that promise when
she was still a foolish,
tongue-tied girl,
scatter-brained,
forgetful,
addle-pated.
She had little memory of those days,
thought of them less.
Miranda walked to the woodlands
to ponder the marriage
proposals.
She kicked slowly through the October leaves,
heard a shuffling at her feet,
peered down at an amber mushroom ring
with a cobweb and dewdrop roof,
and voices
a silver-thin whispered chorus of tones..
"Bring me wood!
Bring me silver spoons and pots.
Bring me flowers and fire."
From every side of the yellow mushroom ring
a band of hard-working faeries trouped out into the grass
gathering things and stuff,
preparing a banquet.
"What are you doing?"
Miranda asked the fairies.
"Preparing the wedding feast
of our friend Riquet with the Tuft!"
answered the smallest one,
thin piping voice drifting from beneath
the stack of linen table clothes it carried.
"Good 'morrow,
dear lady."
Riquet's soft voice floated
from behind the princess,
the poor, misshapen prince stepped
awkwardly
from behind a tree.
Ugly and deformed as ever,
Riquet was dressed in fine
leathers,
linens,
silks.
"How happy am I!
You remembered our wedding today!"
And Miranda remembered her promise
(she could hardly forget some one as fantastic
as Riquet with the Tuft).
She shuffled her feet in the rustling forest litter,
kicked a large oak leaf onto a faerie,
who grumbled in a tiny way.
The princess blushed.
"I must confess to you,
I have not decided
if I shall,
nor whom."
Riquet felt his heart fall to the cool earth.
"Good lady?"
He asked quietly, almost a whisper
"Tell me,
love,
is there something besides my appearance that you despise?"
It's true
Miranda disliked Riquet's looks,
but she knew she enjoyed his presence.
"I like everything else about you.
With you I feel
home,
and wise,
and wanted.
I just don't know if I can live
the rest of my life
with the sight of you
each morning and night."
"Then there is no problem.
You have given your word.
Part of you loves me.
Marry me now.
Who knows what life will bring?"
Miranda considered this.
At last she consented.
"You are right.
I care for you,
more than those princelings
who cared nothing for me then,
but seek my hand today.
I will keep my promise,
and gladly.
We shall wed,
my heart shall be happy with you."
As the last letter of the last word
floated from her mouth,
Riquet with the Tuft began his change.
He straightened;
withered and wrinkled skin stretched taut
over a mass of new muscles rippling beneath it.
The tuft of fuzz atop of his head
spread to cover his knotted, mottled pate.
Before Miranda drew her next breath,
before her stood the most gloriously handsome man she had ever seen
or imagined.
In the reddened autumn sunlight,
the bride and groom embraced
with happiness,
fairies applauded and sang aloud
and danced in delight.
----------
Some say the faerie spell
over Miranda did
nothing at all,
that love alone
transformed Riquet.
Some say Miranda stopped seeing
the tuft of hair
the crooked body
the irregular features,
saw the real man
hidden in the misshapen form.
Some say Miranda's wisdom
was always there,
trapped behind a beautiful face,
a clumsy tongue;
she had always seen
with clear and clever eyes.
Riquet simply waited
for her wisdom to flow.
But fairy spells
or love as magickal cure,
all say
Prince Riquet the Tuft and Princess Miranda Sophia
married and lived
as happily as
wise and beautiful couples did then
or do today.