Once upon a time
in a kingdom far away
there lived an old, old woman
in a gingerbread cafe.
She had three strapping sons
two ugly daughters who told lies
and a beautiful sad stepdaughter
who was a giant in disguise.
Now one day a knight passed by
running off to sea with a kipper
and dropped a golden frog
that laid a talking slipper
which the youngest son then sold
for a magic mashed potato
that ate his elder brothers
and began to grow and grow.
It put the young boy on its back
and flew off across the fields;
his sisters pedlled after it on their spinning wheels.
They crossed a soggy river
they climbed a glass beanstalk
they caught that bad potato
with a knife and fork.
It turned into a princess
and such was their surprise
the beautiful sad steph daughter
grew forty-nine feet high
and the other sisters, curtseying,
(for they were awful snobs)
were squashed beneath her giant feet
into two shapeless blobs.
And when the old old woman
saw this on her TV
she sent a storm that drowned the knight
that very night at sea.
The storm came roaring back again
and with a mighty clout
it knocked the old old woman
upside down and inside out.
It wrapped the giant in a cloud
and drowned it in despair
which made the son dissolve in tears
and vanish in thin air.
The poor potato-faced princess
was crushed by this disaster
and then there was nobody left at all
to live happily ever after.
Dave Calder
