It’s time, friends. When lines line “shimmering rainbow mane” and “shining technicolor pony” appear on the blog, you know what’s coming. Pure magic. Today, we post our final winning entry in the My Little Pony Writing Contest:”Unicorn Hunters” by Kara Krewer.
Unicorn Hunters
More messages this morning:
We are looking for a third
we are looking to complete our
mystical unicorn triad…
But I have no horn,
no spiral, wound-healing magic.
But you are a pretty little filly
we like your shimmering rainbow mane
how the twilight sparkles in your horsefeathers
But I do not pony up
I do not canter
for all the boys and girls.
Yes, I like oats and sugar cubes both,
but I am ambivalent about virgins.
We would let you run along the beach
at sunset and we could sell your pictures
to those companies that make folders
But I swear I do not see it—
I look in the mirror and see no magic,
only the earthbound.
But it’s our dream to share our love
with another woman
Listen: no part of me flutters
for you and I’ve got no saddle, no room for a rider.
I am a singular short beast,
one shining technicolor pony
hiking the crystal path,
and even if I had some harmony to bring
it would not be for you.
Kara Krewer
Kara Krewer grew up on an southwest Georgia.
She is currently an MFA candidate in poetry at
Purdue University, where she is editor-in-chief
of theSycamore Review. Her work has most
recently appeared in The Georgia Review.
Don’t let the magic fizzle — check out our other esteemed My Little Pony Writing Contest winners:
The magic continues! In the latest installment of our winning My Little Pony Writing Contest entries (if you missed the magic, go here and here.) Today, we present the flash piece “Paco” by Winona Leon. Photo, above: OakleyOriginals
Paco
Riding Paco makes my legs melt like wax. Beneath me, I hear his body move like an insolent child’s heartbeat. Tense and excited, he unfurls his legs and then stomps on the ground. His gait feels so light that it doesn’t take much to imagine that we’re flying. It’s because of his paso llano, proof of his proud heritage as a Peruvian Paso. I can imagine those who must have brought these gravity-defying stallions across the arid deserts. Poor stallions: horses that were meant for flight were confined to sugar and cotton plantations because of their strong-willed endurance. It was almost too late until the Peruvian people remembered the importance of these passionate and elegant creatures to their culture.
I’ve never forgotten. After my grandparents purchased him, I quickly discarded my drawers of Barbies and My Little Pony in order to spend time learning to ride. Oh, Paco, my Francisco. I think that he must dream vividly in color, like me.
Usually, I am not afraid of Paco. We often ride together bareback, and I use his mane as my reins. It is Dulcinea sweet, to have such a companion also eager to escape and explore.
But now, he knocks his head back impatiently, and I feel unsure. He bites at flies and will not listen to my demands. When we run, it is too fast. I yield him to stop, slow down, “there, settle, boy,” but he only moves faster. We run past the arena and into the grassy pasture. When we crash through the wire fence, I still can’t help but clutch the reins. Barbed wire ruthlessly slices against my legs and arms. I’m barely conscious as I struggle to hold on, thinking, we’re falling, falling. Icarus, you’ve gone too far. But in the end, it is only me who falls. The ground catches me with arms made of the cruel sharp ends of dead grass and agave lechuguilla.
When my grandparents come for me, I can only ask, “Is Paco all right?”
They look confused, but I understand once I see a brown fleck still sailing through the unfenced pastures beyond our acre. The speck grows smaller and smaller as Paco travels onward, perhaps, meeting the gods.
Later that evening, a neighbor finally catches Paco. This time I will not wait for him. None of my bones are snapped. Nothing will scar. Yet, the taste of betrayal is sharp and hurts more than any physical injury could. He has left me, and there is no room for forgiveness. My grandmother brings Paco in like a prisoner. His South American heritage now hangs around his neck like chains, and his coat is matted, wire still caught around the neck and flank. In that moment, I cannot help but think we tasted infinity together. But Paco had been set on immortality. I watch with sad, knowing eyes while his blood seeps like the sunlight.
Winona Leon
Winona Leon currently studies creative writing and fine arts
at the University of Southern California. She also serves as
Fiction Editor and Co-Founder of Fractal Literary Magazine and works with both Kaya Press and Gold Line Press. Originally
from West Texas, she grew up entranced by a sky full of stars
and all the words that could describe it.
The magic hasn’t fizzled yet — check back soon for our final My Little Pony Writing Contest winner.
I studied the pony as I peeled the foil from another chocolate. Her silky mane draped over one eye. Between the chubby cheeks on her oversized head, a slight smile curled like an apology. Or intuition.
After last week’s magic, let’s keep the pony love going with our second My Little Pony Contest winner: “My Little Pony’s Easter Message” by Debbra Palmer.
My Little Pony’s Easter Message
For years on Easter morning our friends who also didn’t have children left an Easter basket at our doorstep without waking us. We always knew it was them, and they knew we knew. But afterward we’d text them. “Can u believe it? Easter bunz has struck again!”
We’d gorge on peanut butter eggs, chocolate bunnies, marshmallow peeps and jellybeans. But our favorite were the toys: Slinkys, troll dolls, Etch-a-Sketch key rings, wax lips and a mini Gumby.
After three years of this we decided to be Easter Bunny too, and snuck a ridiculously over-filled basket onto their porch before sunrise.
“Is this sad?” I asked my husband on the drive home.
“No, I like candy,” he said as the sky broke open in pink clouds.
Returning home, we found a basket at our door. We must have passed our friends on the highway, or maybe they’d taken a different route. It hadn’t occurred to me this would happen. I’d imagined them waking up and finding their basket like we always had. I silently berated myself for not thinking of this simple logistic.
This year, our basket was topped with a retro My Little Pony our friends had defaced in ink with the words “He is Risen!” I recognized the My Little Pony from childhood, though my mother never let us have them. She thought they were like Barbies, sexualized, shapely plastic figures with eye makeup and dyed hair that little girls swooned over. I explained this to my husband.
“She is kind of hot,” he said rubbing the pony’s blue speckled behind. He whispered into her ear. “Hey little filly, you are so fine! How ‘bout a ride, pony? Ooooh, I might be in looooove.”
“Stop it,” I said trading him a mini Krackel for the pony. I showed him how to stroke her purple hair.
“It’s mane, not hair,” said my husband digging for jellybeans. I studied the pony as I peeled the foil from another chocolate. Her silky mane draped over one eye. Between the chubby cheeks on her oversized head, a slight smile curled like an apology. Or intuition.
At this moment, I saw My Little Pony for who she really was—a girl so pretty she broke everyone’s heart. She didn’t know how, or why, it just always happened, and she couldn’t help it, so all she could do was apologize. And when that didn’t work, she tried apologizing in ways that made her hate herself. And when people talked, they always said she deserved it. My Little Pony’s atonement? Denied.
Later that Easter day, our friends called to say the Easter Bunny had come to their house, too. We all pretended to be surprised and inventoried the contents of our baskets like children. But it was the last year the Easter Bunny walked among us, the year we passed each other in the predawn. We made no apologies or revelations. It just seemed best to wait for him to come again.
Debbra Palmer
An Idaho-born Oregonian, Debbra Palmer studied writing at Portland
State University. Her poems have appeared in Calyx Journal, BLOOM,
Pectriloquy (CHEST Journal for the American College of Chest Physicians)
and The Portland Review. She is the writer and director of the feature
documentary Sky Settles Everything profiling an old-time cattle rancher
and his poet cousin, Verlena Orr. Currently, she is exploring the southwest
and working on a collection of poems inspired by the military alphabet.
We are in the process of posting all four My Little Pony Contest winners on this blog. To read another winner’s prize-pony work, see “Friendship is Magic” by Marci Rae Johnson.
At AWP 2014 in Seattle, amidst the star-studded panels and readings, one event stood out from the pack as the most magical. That’s right, folks. We’re talking about the MAR My Little Pony Writing Contest.
The challenge was simple: write a poem or flash fiction piece somehow celebrating the magic of My Little Pony. From a herd of pony entries, four winners emerged. Today, we’re pleased to publish the first of the winners: “Friendship Is Magic” by Marci Rae Johnson.
Friendship Is Magic
This article may contain an excessive amount of intricate detail that may only interest a specific audience. (November 2013) – My Little Pony, Wikipedia
You are all my very best friends, you cutie pies you pink and purple lovelies I have kept in the original packaging until the day I need you most, until the day the stars fly out of the sky and I can’t stop crying with the one eye remaining, the other having already been given to the Friends of the End of the World. You my sugar cubes, my rainbow brood, each with a sign that makes you unique, the mark of the beast the pony, the unicorn that remains after the flood made everything new. It doesn’t matter anymore what your sin, it’s all afire O the Grand Gala, the Pink Gala where everything you eat is sweet.
Put the sugar in your mouth, O taste and see. The magic
makes it all complete.
Marci Rae Johnson
Marci Rae Johnson teaches English at Valparaiso University, where she serves as Poetry Editor for The Cresset. She is also the Poetry Editor for WordFarm press. Her poems appear or are forthcoming in The Collagist, Quiddity, Hobart, Redivider, Redactions, The Louisville Review, The Christian Century, and 32 Poems, among others. Her first collection of poetry won the Powder Horn Prize and was published by Sage Hill Press in 2013.
The magic will continue when three more winners are revealed in the coming weeks. *sparkle*
