SAN AND THE SNOW BIRD

In an icy hamlet with a wintry fairy tale, lived a snow-bird who sang sweeter than a Nightingale.

She warbled at daybreak to a girl who always had a song on her lips and wore rainbow tiaras for hair clips.

"Who were you, once so happy and bright?

Did the dark side of the moon steal your sunlight?"

"I'm San, Neptune's beloved child

Who naively glided through wonderland mild

With a flawed cast-iron heart shield, merrily wild."

"Snow-bird cooed,"What did transpire, dear? Are you in some icky quagmire?"

"My life's a cryptic screenplay

I'm a dilapidated puzzle, jigsaw pieces all in disarray.

'Twas supposed to be my wedding day.

He never did show up on time,

When the bells at 8.30 did chime."

To the snow-bird, it was easy to discern,

That a chirpy girl had become forlorn.

Someone had ruthlessly impaled San's chambray heart, with an arrow of iron.

"With stardust in my eyes, clutching at moonbeams, 'twas my dream world.

Every kingdom had a prince charming and a happy ending, I was told.

It soon dawned on me that only the roads leading to Oz were made of gold." San confided feebly, yet bold.

"Is that why you're now so dull and gray?

Got hoaxed along the way?"

"Someone like him I don't meet everyday

Foolishly in love, I headed towards my own doomsday

Blindly trusting! Alackaday!!

Now I'm bitter, cold, heart in tatters, a dead giveaway.

Discarded, marooned like a castaway,

I want to fly away to the moon and never return...any day!" San lay huddled and defeated.

***

One October full moon, on an autumn midnight,

The snow-bird went to bathe in the Northern light.

San in solitude, sat in her nook

With lyrical words overflowing in a book.

Dear Diary, snow-bird's far away and can't hear me straight away.

I'm scribbling away in you like a popinjay

Hopelessly lost in a maze, looking for an exit--- thisaway, thataway.

Had I lost my wits, putting my emotions on display?

I've been constantly knocking my head since, for fine dust to drop out, that belongs in...an ash-tray!

Realization dawned too late, to my utter dismay

I thought I would be cherished and loved with, "San, you're mine for keeps! Hurray!"

Instead, his mockery was on high. Why did he betray???

San sighed and closed her diary.

***

Snow-bird sensed her pleas and wails.

Sluiced with lightning speed through winds and gales.

In its beak, clutching an ingot from the Tundra,

In the nick of time reached the hamlet, to give her the gift from the Goddess Aurora's amphora.

Then, magic happened one summer.

San fell in love with books---hook, line, and sinker.

She sat down at her computer

Like an amateur scriptwriter

Bled her memoir, which became a prize winner.

Now San's an explorer

Trying out genres thriller, sinister, heartbreaker.

Asking everyone---Will this nosedive like a disaster...

Or skyrocket as a blockbuster?...

Snow-bird smiles benevolently at her like a trusted friend forever.

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