Learn how I set a honey trap to reveal
My Bluebeard boyfriend’s phishing scam
Then ghosted him!
Too good to be true? Seven tell-tale signs
Your Disney Prince isn’t picture perfect after all...
One: He looks nothing like his selfie.
This was a big giveaway. His beard
Was jet black, his teeth were pearly
White and his skin was orange. I
Should have known he’d be a piece
Of work. He was a plastic fantastic
Masterpiece, especially the abs.
And he wasn’t 37. He was 57.
The beast had been up to his
Tricks for several centuries before
I crossed his path.
Two: He pursues you relentlessly.
Even before our first date my
Profile pic was black and blue
From prods and swipes. I was
Lost in a bouquet jungle and
Smothered by stuffed toys.
My front porch looked like
A memorial for another lost
Girl.I felt suffocated. I nearly was.
Like the others; hacked-up
And stuffed in his junk-trunk.
I should have run then.
Three: He wants to cook you dinner
At his house.
It’s a gated mansion draped in
Spanish moss. He likes to get away
From it all. So will you; when you’ve been
Hogtied, spit-roasted and served up as
S’mores. Make it coffee-date and
Visit the firing-range first. You can’t
Rely on a passing lumberjack with a
Chainsaw to do your dirty work for you.
Four: His life is a pity-party with you
As guest of honour.
Wives One and Two died tragically
Young: cancer and a house-fire.
He’ll show you their portraits on the
Guided tour. Think ‘Last Duchess’:
Get the picture? He’s a fan of Joel
Witkin’s photo-realism: ‘So lifelike’
He murmurs, leaking crocodile tears
As Martha and Elizabeth watch your
Back with glassy stares. He’s coming
In for the kill by appealing to your
Caring nature. You must be a really
Great counsellor he croons, through
His perfect canines. Your ego is
Aroused and you agree, despite
Yourself, that your biggest strength
Is your vulnerability. He gifts you
Brene Brown’s ‘Daring Greatly’
As bedside reading. Bin it. Get
Gavin de Becker’s ‘Gift of Fear’
On your nightstand—now. You
Realise he has a subtext. Rest
Assured he wants to soothe you
To sleep with those big manly
Hands. And a pillow. Over your face.
Five: Ask to meet his family and
Friends.
He’s elusive. He wants you all
To himself. All his friends are
Creeps and perverts anyway.
He’ll show you off to them later,
When you’re exclusive: in a snuff
Movie on the dark web. He’s sorry
He can’t make brunch with the
Girls. His mother is sick and he’s
All she’s got. He’s moving her in
Piece by piece and her old bones
Need to settle, he jokes, mimicking
Her fixed grin and gritted teeth.
He’s thinking Mommie dearest will
Be quite at home: strung on piano
Wire, alongside his trophy wife.
Six: You’ve got keys to his castle but his
Man-cave is off-limits.
It’s aroused your Nancy Drew instinct
To snoop. It’s how he snared the others.
Be like me in the Original Grimm.
Not the Perrault remake: go armed
And take backup. You’ll have a
Clarice Starling moment with the
Dead girls. But I hate magic realism
So they won’t come alive again.
Shoot him dead and torch the place.
Leave town. Dodge the cops.
Don’t be a ‘Thelma and Louise’
Cliche; so dump that flaky friend.
Grift that hustler. No cliffhanger
Endings please. Enjoy a road
Trip with Jimmy instead.
Seven: Trust me on this: my story
Is your survival manual!
If you’d rather take a man’s word
For it; wise-up like Einstein, and re-
Read your fairytales. Not Disney;
Patriarchy is a plot-twister and
Casts you as victim. No hero will
Save you. He’ll just blame you for
Being a woman. Old tales are retold
As urban myths; scary woods are
Concrete jungles and wolves lurk
In the friend-zone. The terrain has
Had a makeover but you’re still
Alone in the shadows. You don’t
Have a magic doll in your pocket
Anymore. You cast her aside as
You outgrew fairytales. Perhaps
You still hear her whisper that
Her story is yours, too.
Bio
Kate Meyer-Currey lives in Devon. A varied career in frontline settings has fuelled her interest in gritty urbanism, contrasted with a rural upbringing, often with a slipstream twist.
She has over a hundred poems published in print and online journals and anthologies in the UK and internationally. Her poem "Gloves" was in the top 100 of the UK’s Poetry for Good competition (2021) and "We got this" was shortlisted for the 2021 Black in White poetry competition. "Boys of Vallance Road" came third in the poetry category of the London Society’s Love Letter to London competition (March 2022). Her chapbooks County Lines (Dancing Girl) and Cuckoo’s Nest (Contraband) are due out in 2022.
Publications include:
"Family Landscape: Colchester 1957" (Not Very Quiet, 2020), "Invocation" (Whimsical Poet, 2021),
"Dulle Griet", "Scold’s Bridle", "Reconnaissance" (RavenCageZine, 2021), "Fear the reaper"
(Red Wolf Journal, 2021), "Stream: Timberscombe" (A River of Poems, 2021), "Not so starry night"
(SheSpeaks, 2021), "Dimpsey" (Snapdragon, 2021), "Mask" (Disquiet Arts, 2021),
"Magnolia Stellata" (Constellations, Literary North, 2021), "Challenge" (Poetry and Covid,
March 2021), "Scorpio rising" (Noctivagant Press, April 2021), "Scrapheap Challenge" (Handyuncappedpen,
April 2021), "Scrubber in PPE", (Skirting Around, April 2021), "New perspective" (Planisphere HQ,
April 2021), "Daffs" (Blue Heron Review, April 2021), "Hilly Fields", (Pure Slush, Lifespan Vol 2,
April 2021), "Supplication to the Morrigan, Wolf Ridge" (Quail Bell, April 2021), "Kintsugi" (Aurora,
Kira Kira, May 2021), "Dregs" (Seinundwerden, May 2021), "Trigger" (Collateral, May 2021),
"Minimum credula postero" (Ponder Savant, May 2021), "Palisade: Seville Oranges, December"
(Odyssey, May 2021), "Morning: A38", "Sunflowers", "Devon Autumn", "Dawn Chorus", "Colours of Stars" (Bloom, May 2021), "Rude awakening" (Granfalloon: A Speculative Fiction Zine, June 2021), "Restless" (Open Door, June 2021), "Purple Jellyfish Shirt" (Mono, June 2021), "Re-emergence" (Her Inside: Women in the Lockdown, June 2021), "Wolf Ridge", "Infinitesimal (1-3)", Dregs" (Poetica Review, June 2021), "Summit and depths", "Hawthorns", (Deep Overstock, June 2021).
Author's note
Both these poems could be described as an intersectional feminist reworking of traditional fairy tales. I was a historian long before I became a poet and take an active interest in current ideas: hence the stylistic reference to articles on Pinterest, for example.
I was sparked by a Radio 4 broadcast on how traditional fairytales were reworked by feminist theory. I discovered that seventeenth century patriarchy (aka Charles Perrault) had sanitised tales like Bluebeard to make the female protagonists passive rather than agents of their own survival. This was in sharp contrast to the reality which underpins folk tales: short lives, child mortality, step-parents, war and starvation (to name but a few). These tales were survival manuals, if you will.
I was born in 1969 and have lived through the realisation society has recently had to accept:
that "boys will be boys" means abuse, predation and murder. Savile, Weinstein, Epstein, MeToo, plus institutional misogyny in the UK police force (highlighted by Sarah Everard’s killing last year) tell us that this is wrong on all counts. Never mind internet dating as a new playground for predators.
I have read texts like De Becker’s Gift of Fear which analyse how women’s social conditioning to be pleasant and compliant made them unwitting victims. It made sense to me (backed up by time working in prisons and forensic units). A lot of Hollywood romances feature stalkers as leading men…
I wanted to challenge these assumptions by reminding everyone (not just women) to use their wits and trust their guts in unfamiliar situations because it might just save their life or get them out of a tricky situation. I apologise to fans of Thelma and Louise, but the ending has always bothered me. These poems are my solution to this problem: how do you commit a felony and escape alive with your man?
