Serene And Wise As Babka Was

Jan Pienkowski who spent his childhood in

Poland, illustrated the book “The Golden

Bird” which contains a story told by Edith

Brill, woven from the various stories she

had been told by her Polish father long

 

Ago, Pienkowski infused these with new

dramatic feeling through his silhouettes

of clean lines - I love starting at these &

dreaming of Babka, wise forest woman

bright enough to think of practical things

 

When offered three wishes by the Bird King,

instead of squandering her wishes as most

wish-stories by genies report - she wished

for the forest to be safe, a warm fountain to

slake her bird-friends’ thirst and for a fire

 

That would never burn up during winter snow

when she could not gather wood outside and

soon the water saved her life, the fire kept her

alive when a robber waited for embers to form

and the forest was not destroyed as the Evil

 

Queen ordered - this tale I adore & reread to

reflect on its meaning while reworking the plot

in my mind wishing to grow as content, serene

and wise as Babka was with her friends the wild

birds, never missing human company - just like

 

I am friends with the sun, the wind and the water

in which I swim and my favourite authors whose

words have been weighed and trimmed so that

some, like the Johnny Trilogy by Terry Pratchett,

read like a poem, stripped down to its essence

 

Forming a beautiful outline for the story within a

sound that charms the heart - being an official in

an office I used to read between projects, now at

home I read between laundry and dishes and the

stories keep me going, together with lively music

 

Infusing energy while washing and hanging and

sweeping and cleaning of which I don’t do enough,

I confess, but I’m willing to try harder as practice

makes perfect, I hope…

................................................................. 

Then Babka saved the King who admitted he

was the author of his own misfortune, he had

known the Evil Queen hated him yet he had

pandered to her wishes until she turned him

into a gray gander and then Babka found and

 

Revived him, she refused the lace and satin

and rode with him in her rural costume then

returned to her hut in the forest with its fire

that never died (and which had traveled with

her when she saved the King) & the fountain

 

That never stopped even in the heaviest snow,

the Prince married the Chestnut Maiden and

they still spent some nights alone in a special

forest house and visited Babka in her hut and

I sighed, the perfect ending as Babka refused

 

To become a great lady and remained a broom-

maker alone in the forest, delighted with all her

bird-friends and remaining loyal to the Golden

Bird who gifted her the forest, water and fire…

 

[Edith Brill “The Golden Bird” with pictures by

Jan Pienkowski, J.M. Dent & Sons, London, 1970]