“Mirror, mirror, on the wall,
Who’s the fairest of all?”
“Oh Queen, your face is brighter than the shining sun,
I wish to say that you’re the fairest one,
But that wouldn’t be completely true,
For there’s a girl, whose fairer than you,
With skin as white as snow, hair as black as ebony,
Lips as red as a cherry, and with eyes as blue as the sea.”
“Snow White!” the queen exclaimed, a disgusted look on her face,
“In this kingdom, she shan’t have a place.”
The Queen came up with a plan,
She decided to get rid of her, and called her huntsman.
The huntsman took Snow White far away from the daylight,
Deep into the woods, where it was darker than night.
“I cannot kill a poor, little girl,” he said,
“The Queen will be furious if she knows you’re not dead,
Run away as far as you can, m’lady,
I pray for the stars to guide you to safety.”
And he left her in the middle of nowhere,
Why was her life all of a sudden a nightmare?
She could see menacing figures all around,
Not a kind soul or sliver of light could be found.
She woke up at the break of dawn,
And was surprised to see seven dwarves, two birds and a fawn,
“What are you doing all alone?
In the middle of the woods, on your own?”
And Snow White told them her sad story,
The huntsman and the evil queen and her vanity.
“You can stay in our house,” one of the dwarves offered,
“You’ll stay safe there, you have my word.”
So she stayed in the dwarves’ little cottage,
Cleaning the house and cooking porridge,
To teach the queen a lesson, she thought of a way,
While the dwarves went to the mines everyday.
Once a bird, whom she had asked to spy on the queen,
Told her of something she had seen,
The queen had heard of Snow White’s false demise,
And was coming to kill her in an old woman’s disguise.
“I’m lost, may I come in, my dear?”
It was the queen disguised, but Snow White didn’t have an ounce of fear.
“Come in,” she said, plastering a fake smile on her face,
And served her tea with elegant grace.
“Oh, you’re so kind, I think I must give you a treat,”
The queen reached inside her bag, “Here’s a special apple you should eat.”
Before she could give the apple to her,
She suddenly disappeared in a blur.
Snow White clapped her hands in glee,
The magic she had put in the tea, had worked correctly,
Now the queen was imprisoned in a mirror-filled room,
Her vanity being the cause of her doom.
Gayathri Achar is a second year student of biotechnology. She loves to weave words into poems and stories. She also enjoys singing Carnatic music and playing tennis.
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