Fact Checking The Fairy Tales I Find

[I dedicate this poem to my newspaper editor father who hated the word "gossamer"]

fact checking the fairy tales I find:

someone has a glass slipper in the lost and found;

a few missing jewels from an abandoned mine;

the last train out for a morning deadline

and the cloak of invisibility.

fact checking the fairy tales, certain elves

have told me to mind my own business.

but I've gotten wise to the candy houses.

I ain't parochial.

at the movies, I bring my own jr. mints.

oh anyway. they'll let a few things slide

in the glass offices.

they always do.

but I'm on the case and cannot lose.

isn't that what they say when fact checking the

fairytales' fact checker comes down to it

you better have your gossamer wings on straight.

mary angela douglas 10 june 2014