Work Text:
The Staryk King whose name we’ll never know
Brought Miryem silver to transform to gold.
She found a smith to shape it, hammered fine,
And sold the links for gold, asked for a fee.
She didn’t know the price they each would pay.
The Staryk King in cold dismay wed one
He deemed unworthy. Now Miryem wore upon
Her head a royal diadem1, entrapped
In his blue winter realm. And her handmaids –
Attendants, or her jailers, who could say?
She named them Flek and Tsop.
In Lithvas Mirnatius thought himself a king.
The power that he held was not his own.
“What shall be done for me, the one the tsar
Wishes to honor?”2 asked demon Chernobog
In smoldering glee. When the tsar wed Irina
The demon swore to drink her soul like tea.
But in her Staryk silver she could move
Between the worlds. Her wedding night: she fled
The demon (who’d owned the tsar’s own soul
Before his birth). Its fiery hunger burned.
Amidst Staryk riches: emptied pools
And ashen trellises beneath dead vines.
A smudge, like coals extinguished.
Some rot of thieving fire threatened all.
Still Miryem transformed silver with her touch
To gold, and in return the Staryk Lord
Granted her wish to venture to
The sunlit lands. Through trickery the King
Was trapped and bound, his life a trade
To stop encroachment of the killing frosts.
But as the King paced, held for Chernobog
Miryem admitted it sorrowed her to see
The melting of his life as winter warmed.
She thought of Tsop and Flek; Flek’s daughter; Shofer;
All the Staryk children who would starve
If the Lord of the White Forest died.
She could not bear to see those people killed,
Nor the destruction of the Staryk King...
To be continued.
Staryk silver.
1. Esther 2:17. Ok, it's a stretch, the Staryk King does not love Miryem at this point. But the royal diadem works - return to text
2. Esther 6:6] Yes, I'm making Chernobog play the role of Haman.- return to text