Leopoldine Core & Eileen Myles

17 Fairy Tales

A fairy tale in which a young farm girl looks into the eyes of her father’s cow. In them she sees footage from other times – a film reel. No one else sees this and they claim the girl is mad. Finally, the cow is slaughtered and she really does go mad.

A fairy tale in which a young man who works in a mental hospital falls in love with the mooing songs a strange woman makes each night as she sits in her corner before she’s led to bed.

A fairy tale in which a handsome elf seduces a man on his way home from work. The man is convinced to bring the elf back to his apartment and they drink dark bottles of beer on his bed. But the elf does not kiss him. The elf does not even touch him. Then, with a single burning glance, he steals the man’s memories and lets himself out.

A fairy tale in which a siren screaming its heart out on a rescue truck on avenue A suddenly feels it is alive.

A fairy tale in which the orange candle full of light while its neck is melting begins to cry.

A fairy tale in which the small dog lying on your bed chewing a bone with dark burning eyes is thinking about the novel it will write.

A fairy tale in which another dog on another block barks and says me too.

Another siren on another truck is coughing and choking.

A fairy tale in which the car that passes down below while the two women are eating popcorn is actually a great fish that has swallowed the street.

A fairy tale in which a parasite talks to his host – a portly man in his 50s. The parasite says, “ You never do what you really wanna do.”

A fairy tale in which a woman looks into her newborn’s eyes and sees the venomous spirit of her grandfather – a cruel man who once bit her hand to wake her from a nap. The woman drowns her baby then looks in the mirror and screams.

A fairy tale in which two sharks encircle a surfer girl. She has her belly on the board and is paddling back to shore. They decide not to eat her and instead penetrate her sexually.

A fairy tale in which a man comes home to find that his teen son is enchanted. The boy has a shimmering yellow aura and looks the man very directly in the eye. The man can tell that the boy now knows everything. The boy knows WHAT HE DID. The man knows he must leave town.

A fairy tale in which a chair speaks. The chair says only terrible things and can drive any sentient being to suicide.

A fairy tale in which two women agree that the man next-door is an elf and even has an elfin name. At night they lie in bed and see his smile and can hear him quietly dancing. They wonder which one of them he wants for his bride.

A fairy tale in which a rat terrier falls in love with her owner. He is blonde and German. The dog feels certain that she is a woman and wants to kiss the man as she. The dog kills his girlfriend with one chomp and the man is hysterical. But he loves the dog and cannot gas her. He sets her loose in the woods.

A woman watches her partner write and wonders why she always looks left-handed when she is not. She continues to watch and slowly she realizes that the pen is left-handed. Awkwardly it suffers her grip.






Leopoldine Core was born and raised in Manhattan. She attended Hunter College. Her work has appeared in Open City and The Literarian.

Eileen Myles was born in Cambridge, Mass. in 1949, and moved to New York City in 1974 to be a poet. Her many volumes of poetry and fiction include Sorry, Tree; Chelsea Girls; Not Me; Skies; Cool for You; The Importance of Being Iceland: Travel Essays in Art; and Inferno (a poet's novel).