That Story

From "Cinderella" by Anne Sexton:

Cinderella and the prince
lived, they say, happily ever after,
like two dolls in a museum case
never bothered by diapers and dust,
never arguing over the timing of an egg,
never telling the same story twice,
never getting a middle-aged spread,
their darling smiles pasted on for eternity.
Regular Bobbsey Twins.
That story.

Many of us easily criticize, as Sexton does, the fairy tale for its cliches: the rags-to-riches rise of heroes and heroines, the misshapen villain, the cloying romance, the impossibly happy ending.
But if we consider folk tales, before they were fashioned into literary fairy tales by people like Perrault and the Grimms, we see what Warner calls the tales' "optative" mood: "(they announce) what might be."

So folk and fairy tales are tales of faith.

Sure, many of us often equate faith with delusion. But I often find myself admiring people who live by faith. I chucked religion out the window at 14, when I looked up the word "atheist" in the dictionary and suddenly found my calling in godlessness. But those who chose to live by something that is not tangible, to live by the nectar of stories of gods and prophets. Those folks, I can't help but admire.