Part 1
A long, long time ago, a rich man loved his wife
But they had no children to complete their life.
In the front garden of their house stood a juniper;
One snowy day in winter, the wife cut her finger
While peeling an apple beneath the tree.
She said, ‘How happy I would be
If I could have a little child
As red as blood and as white as snow!’
First came spring thaw, when meadows
Filled with flowers. Then summer came;
The aromatic juniper petals started to unfold
And the rich man’s wife discovered she was with child.
By autumn, she was sorrowful and afraid that she would die.
As she plucked red juniper berries, she began to cry
And begged her husband:
‘If I should die, please bury me
Underneath the juniper tree.’
Soon a bonny boy was born,
As white as snow and red as blood,
But his mother faded away and died.
The rich man buried her
Under the juniper,
Wept and mourned until his tears were dry
And then found himself another wife,
Who bore him a daughter, Margery,
Who she loved very much
While she detested her husband’s son.
This step-mother was very cruel;
She pushed, punched and pinched the boy, until he was afraid.
There was nowhere in the house he could safely play.
One day the step-mother went into her fruit store,
A heavy-lidded chest with a great, sharp, iron lock,
And her daughter asked her for an apple.
One for herself and one for her brother.
‘Yes,’ was the reply from her wicked mother,
‘When he comes home he shall have one too.’
When the little boy came to the door,
The wicked woman spoke in the sweetest tones:
‘Come in, my dear,
I have for you an apple here.’
The boy thought she was very kind,
Not realising what was on her mind
When she lifted the lid of the storage chest.
As the child reached in, she slammed the lid
So hard it chopped off his head.
© Kim M. Russell, 2016
Images found on Pinterest and www.mediastorehouse.com
Part 2
Not knowing how to shirk the blame,
The wicked stepmother was afraid;
She searched for a handkerchief
To secure her stepson’s head
And then she sat him on a stool
As if he were not dead
Under the juniper tree
With an apple in his hand.
Running in from the garden
To find her mother by the fire
Stirring a pot, Margery enquired:
‘What’s wrong with my brother?
I asked him for the apple, mother,
That he’s holding in his hand.
But he did not say a word
And I do not understand.
He looks so pale and I am afraid.’
Her mother replied,
‘Fiddlesticks! Ask him again
And, if he gives no answer,
He’ll respond to pain.’
When Margery’s brother
Didn’t reply, she boxed his ear
And his head fell off –
She ran away in fear.
When her father came home to dinner
And asked for his little boy,
Margery wept bitterly and could not reply.
But the evil stepmother easily told a lie,
That he was visiting his uncle
Without saying good-bye.
Margery was sorry
For what she thought she’d done;
She took her best handkerchief,
Wrapped up her brothers’ bones
And buried them under the juniper tree,
Where a bird sat, singing merrily.
Images found on Pinterest
Part 3
When the bird’s song was over it flew away;
Gone too were the handkerchief and the boy
And pretty Margery smiled with joy.
It landed on the roof of a goldsmith’s house,
Singing: ‘My mother killed her little son;
My father thought me lost and gone;
But sister Margery pitied me
And laid me under the juniper tree.’
The goldsmith was fashioning a golden chain
And he asked the bird to sing again
In return for the chain, which it took in its claw
And into the sky the little bird soared,
Until it came to the shoemaker’s house.
Again the little bird sang its song
So sweetly the shoemaker sang along,
Rewarding the bird with a pair of red shoes.
The little bird flew to a nearby mill,
Where the sails turned clipper clapper.
It sang its song not one time but two
In return for a millstone, then off it flew
To Margery and her family,
Where it sat on top of the juniper tree
And sang: ‘My mother killed her little son;
My father thought me lost and gone;
But sister Margery pitied me
And laid me under the juniper tree.’
The father ran into the garden to marvel at the bird,
That dropped the chain around his neck without a single word.
The red shoes it dropped at Margery’s feet;
She put them on and danced in the street.
It dropped the millstone
On the mothers head
And she fell down dead.
The juniper tree burst into flame,
The little boy appeared again,
And they lived together happily
In the shade of the juniper tree.
Warwick Goble – ”The Fairy Book” spiritoftheages.com
© Kim M. Russell, 2016
writing in north norfolk 