Fame

Poem by Vanshika Srivastava

How is it that it was I, 
she thought, who fell from grace, 
while the sot who arranged the facade 
was berated, yet still the very great? 

The pin failed to drop on his uncanny schemes. 
They chanted in front of the staged display 
that the dreaded was she. 
“Glistening was her charm and her stealth,” they said. 
Honourable treat was she to the children, 
whose misdemeanours were labelled her very own 
reflection. And what more is hidden: his slinking tricks 
that puppeteered everyone right through it. 

Just a scream, shattering the upheld belief. 
Over twinkled wine and cherry-topped cakes, 
her lies were truths, hidden, to keep herself safe. 
But held out were their hands, the misters’ and misses’, 
to the wisps of one man’s promises. 
And he, the wicked, just smiled. 
As auburn hair did cascade down her bare state, 
so she fell from favour with his lies and fame.