Stave 1
Down below the ocean,
Far from the beach,
Blue as cornflowers, clear as glass,
Deeper than an anchor line’s reach,
Where plants ripple as fish pass,
Mermaids play,
Telling tales of a human world.
How strange to think that up on earth
Flowers had a fragrance and birds sang.
They were impatient for the day,
Their fifteenth birthday;
To sit on rocks in the moonlight
And watch great ships sail.
The youngest mermaid had the longest wait,
Gazing through dark water at the pale glow of the moon,
Listening to her sisters’ tales of lying on sandbars
In a calm sea, watching the shore until it was late,
When lights sparkled like hundreds of stars
And bells in church towers rang.
Oh how she listened when her sisters sang
Of clouds of scarlet and plum,
A white veil of wild swans
Flying across a rosy sun.
They had seen green hills, forests and castles,
The sea in winter with icebergs like pearls
And children with no fish tails.
Image found on Pinterest
Stave 2
On the day the mermaid turned fifteen,
As the sun
Dipped
Slowly
Into
The deep,
She rose like a bubble and burst through to see
Coral clouds glitter, the evening star gleam.
Buoyed on the ocean, with one raised sail,
Was a three-masted ship.
She was entranced in the wavering light,
As hundreds of lanterns lit up the night.
Lured by music from the barque
To a porthole whose brightness pierced the dark,
She saw in the cabin a dark-eyed prince
And fell in love.
There arose all at once a terrible gale,
Hideous waves like ghostly whales
Caused planks to burst and masts to snap;
In a crackle of lightning, the vessel cracked.
The mermaid plunged down after her love,
Raised his body to the waves above
That carried
Them to shore.
Image found on dulac.artpassions.net
Stave 3
The storm passed;
There was no ship in sight.
Red and glowing, the sun rose,
Marking the end of night,
Bringing life to the prince’s face.
She kissed his forehead and his eyes,
Stroked his wet hair and his cheek
Underneath the lightening sky.
Towing him gently to a little bay,
Where fine white sand had washed ashore,
Soft and warm in the youthful light of day,
The little mermaid left the prince.
Before her was dry land:
Tall blue mountains,
Green forests,
A church where bells rang
And young girls roamed
In a fertile garden.
Disguised in sea foam,
Concealed behind a crop of rocks
The little mermaid could only watch
As a maiden found the prince.
When he was revived
He smiled
At everyone but the mermaid
Who had saved his life.
Sad and silent
She returned
To her sisters and the sea.
Image found on Pinterest
Stave 4
Early every morning
And in twilight shadows,
The little mermaid
Rose up to the shallows
Where she left the prince.
The seasons turned:
Snow melted on the mountains,
Sunshine bounced merrily
Amongst the crystal fountains.
The little mermaid’s sisters
Recognised her heartbreak
And took her to a castle,
Built of pale and yellow stone,
With staircases of marble
And magnificent golden domes.
The mermaid waited every night
Beneath the prince’s balcony,
Alone in the moonlight,
Her heart full of longing
To be a human.
Image found on Pinterest
Stave 5
Hearing that mortals
Had eternal souls
The mermaid yearned
To be loved by the prince;
For that she would give up her fishtail.
She set off for the maelstrom,
The sea witch’s home,
Barren of sea flowers and grass,
Where currents swirled and roared,
Through which she had to pass.
She swam through a fearsome forest,
Of monsters
Coiled around bleached bones
Of humans who had perished,
Where she found the crone,
Who granted whatever she wished.
The sea witch made a potion
That she must drink on shore,
When she would remain a human
For ever more.
If the prince did not recognise her,
On the morning after he married another
Her heart would burst;
She would become foam on water.
The only payment
Was the mermaid’s enchanting voice:
For which
The sea witch
Cut out her tongue.
Image found on Pinterest
Stave 6
For the last time the mermaid returned to her home.
She thought her heart would break as she rose through the foam
And swam to shore.
The silver moon was high when she drank the bitter potion;
The sharpest pain passed through her and she fainted away.
When the sun had risen over the ocean
She awoke to the prince’s stare.
Her fishtail was gone and she was naked –
The mermaid covered herself with her hair.
When the prince asked for her name,
Her sad eyes were tender but no words came.
Each exquisite step felt like razor-sharp knives
But hand in hand with the prince
She drifted like sea foam.
At the castle she was clothed in silk and linen
She was the fairest of the women,
Even the slave girls who sang for the prince.
Oh how she wanted to sing!
When the slaves danced,
She raised her pale arms,
Rose up on her toes and took to the floor,
Dancing as no one had danced before
On knives.
She slept outside the prince’s door
On a cushion of velvet
Like a pet.
He took her riding in fragrant forests;
They climbed steep mountains among the clouds.
But in deepest night when everyone slept
The mermaid cooled her burning feet
In the cold sea water
Soothed by the songs
Of Neptune’s daughters.
Image found on Pinterest
Stave 7
The prince’s love for the mermaid grew
But he could never make her his bride.
She reminded him of the maiden
On the shore who saved his life;
It was her he wanted to be his wife.
It wasn’t long before the prince was betrothed
To a princess across the sea.
The mermaid accompanied him on the trip;
They sailed away on a magnificent ship
While the prince and his sailors danced and sang.
But a mermaid who has no tears
Suffers so much more;
In the moonlit night she sat and stared,
Listening to the ocean roar,
Thinking about her home.
Her sisters ascended from the deep,
They wrung their hands, began to weep,
And then disappeared below.
The ship arrived in a harbour
Where all the church bells rang,
Trumpets blew from tall towers
And choirs sang
To announce the prince’s wife,
Who he recognised at once
As the maiden who saved his life.
Image found on Pinterest
Stave 8
When evening came they boarded the ship;
The princess’s dowry was stored in the hold
And the couple slept on the quarterdeck
In a tent of purple and gold.
Away from the glow of the lanterns’ light,
The mermaid knew this was the last night
She would breathe the same air
And see the same stars
As the prince.
Resting on the handrail,
She looked out to the east,
Awaiting the first ray of sunlight
And dreading its might.
She saw her sisters emerge from the spray,
Their hair shorn from their heads
By the witch in return for a silvery knife
For the mermaid to take the prince’s life
Before the sun came up;
His blood must wash her human feet
To restore the mermaid’s tail.
She pulled aside the purple drapes
And kissed the prince goodbye.
As a bloody light crept into the sky
She threw the knife into the waves
That shone red where it fell.
The mermaid dived from the ship
And melted like foam in the swell.
Image found on Pinterest
writing in north norfolk 