Happily Never After

A little girl locked in a tower
Waits for her prince.
She waits waits waits
The clock ticking on the wall
Day after day after day after day
Always tick tick waiting tick tick
For years tick wait tick wait tick tick wait
On her eighteenth birthday her prince comes
And they share a tender kiss.
The mother closes the storybook and says goodnight.
Now her daughter will wait wait wait for a prince who will not show up.
Tick tick tick
The clock in the tower?
No the clock in the alligator
Haunting captain hook
Lurking waiting waiting ticking tick tick tick wait
Ashes ashes we all fall down
We get back up and put Disney™ band aids
Over our scraped knees.
We eat our milk and cookies
Out of sippy cups,
Dragging our teddy bears on the floor.
We click the tv remote and watch Disney™ movies
Starring unrealistic beauty and
Unhealthy romances.
When we get older, we believe in true love
We swear by it as we hide pepper spray in lipstick tubes,
And hide knives in our knee high socks.
Tick tick tick time goes on tick tick tick
Until we’re 17 and we’re hiding our defenses
Behind a curtain of pastels and glitter until
Tick tick tick
We’re 25 years old suddenly and signing up for self-defense classes
Because the boys who pulled our pigtails never stopped chasing us
Because boys will be boys!
And we get pastel brass knuckles
Because we are still little girls, who never asked
To grow up so violently,
But tick tick tick
Stop tick stop
The clock is broken
Tick tick
T i c k  t i c k  t i c k