If our thirteenth child is a girl, all her twelve brothers must die, so that she may be very rich, and the kingdom hers and hers alone.
     from Household Tales, collected by the Brothers Grimm.

I never knew
their names. Only
twelve coffins
in one straight line,
filling the cold grey crypt.

I never wanted
more bones. Only
those already
in my hands,
toys for our plain stone halls.

I never knew
true wealth. Only
the gold glittering in
fairy tales,
absent from our own stone crypt.

I never wanted
death. Only
voices, hands,
silken words
to fill the cold grey halls.

I hold a kingdom
of dry bones,
a kingdom of
shadowed whispers.

                           If only
I could have known my brothers.
If only I had
more than coffins.

If only this gold
did not burn my skin,
did not burn me with its cold.

(Editors’ Note: “The Thirteenth Child’ is read by Erika Ensign in the Uncanny Magazine Podcast Episode 7A.)

© 2015 by Mari Ness