Land Where Fairies Abound

There were some secret critters there

by old Fairy Bay

one-by-one, in the air

arising day-by-day.

 

You’d have to earn their trust if you

want to catch a glimpse

if not, then you can say adieu

no chance to meet a nymph.

 

Dainty little creatures, they

inhabit old Keji

response to what the Mi’kmaq say

translates to a “fairy”.

 

They are people too, you know

and no, they’re not discrete

calm yourself and take it slow,

for you, this is some feat.

 

-Sadia Amin

 

 

 

Explication/Explanation:

The above poem is in the form of a ballad, a poetic form in which there are four stanzas, four lines each. There are alternating lines of one iambic tetrameter, one iambic trimeter. There is a rhyming scheme of ABAB. I chose this format because I liked the more fun, folksy feeling and following a specific structure made it easier to establish a poem that actually made sense.

This poem was also just a fun piece that I wanted to play with, and it has little to no deep meaning behind it. At least that was not intended.

The poem’s title, Land Where Fairies Abound, is a reference to the Mi’kmaq translation of the word, Kejimkujik. Kejimkujik is the name of one of Canada’s National Parks located in Nova Scotia. I was inspired by this to write the poem loosely based off of the mythology of the people inhabiting the area, the Mi’kmaq. As a side note, remember that this is not an actual tale or story tied to a specific tradition; I used the translation of the word Kejimkujik to write a piece about fairies.

First Stanza:

There were some secret critters there

by old Fairy Bay

one-by-one, in the air

arising day-by-day.

The first line introduces the “secret critters”, which is referring to the fairies that are said to dwell the forests of Kejimkujik. The second line, by old Fairy Bay, is in reference to an actual bay in the National Park. The last two lines are just to create a sense of imagery of such creatures that would come about, without describing the actual fairies. This gives readers the opportunity to imagine how they would want the fairies to look like, while giving them a loose structure as to what they’re doing. I only put capitalization for the first word, There, and for Fairy Bay. Fairy Bay is the name of an actual place, so it made sense to capitalize those words; however, the first word was capitalized because it gave notion to the beginning of almost a sentence, or just introducing a new idea. There is no punctuation, except for a comma after one-by-one, and a period at the end of the last line. The comma is to create the much needed pause, so the line doesn’t sound choppy. The period at the end is to close the introduction.

Second Stanza:

You’d have to earn their trust if you

want to catch a glimpse

if not, then you can say adieu

no chance to meet a nymph.

The first line introduces a new idea, so the first word is capitalized. The first two lines indicate how the fairies, such small, innocent creatures, will only allow you to even look at them if you earn their trust and abide by moral rules of character and understanding. The second two lines represent the consequence of not earning their trust, which is not being able to ever meet them. Like many occasions in life, this chance may only ever come once, if the procedure is done so correctly. The only punctuation in this stanza is a comma after if not, and a period at the end of the last line. The comma serves the same purpose as in the first stanza, creating the natural pause that feels right. The period, is again, to close the stanza, and close the new idea introduced from the first line of this stanza.

Third Stanza:

Dainty little creatures, they

inhabit old Keji

response to what the Mi’kmaq say

translates to a “fairy”.

This stanza describes the fairies a bit more, and references the Mi’kmaq folklore of fairies inhabiting the area. In the second line, I use the word Keji instead of the full name of Kejimkujik. This was not only to fit in to the ballad format, but also in reference to how a lot of Nova Scotians refer to Kejimkujik. In the third line, it further emphasizes that this is poem is referring to the Mi’kmaq folklore, just remembering that this piece is only inspired by such and doesn’t actually contain any historical context. The first word of the first line, Dainty, is capitalized to (you guessed it) introduce a new idea. Keji and Mi’kmaq are capitalized because they are to proper nouns. The comma after Dainty little creatures is used as a way to introduce information that isn’t entirely essential to the piece in order to understand it, but serves the purpose of giving further description. Fairy is in quotation marks because it is the interpretation of the Mi’kmaq translation. Remember, interpretations aren’t always accurate. Once again, there is a period at the end to close the statement.

Fourth Stanza:

They are people too, you know

and no, they’re not discrete

calm yourself and take it slow,

for you, this is some feat.

Ah, the final stanza. This introduces an entirely new idea, so it is at this point that I don’t need to explain the capitalization and the comma at the end. First, I’ll mention the commas, since there’s quite a few. The commas in the first three lines serve the same purpose: creating the natural pause that comes when reading. The last comma is to emphasize a point that is almost making fun of humanity, in a way. Okay, enough with punctuation, let’s move on to the meaning of this stanza. The first two lines talk about how fairies are not that different from “us” (“us” can refer to however you want it to). We can look at this meaning from a generalized perspective: it is not only referring to fairies but to all individuals who are deemed as different and weird. Embracing each others quirks is what will make us look past the differences and see how similar everyone truly is. The words yourself and you in the third and fourth lines are referring to humanity, as I feel that we need to slow down in life in order to understand each other. This is what greatness is, in my opinion.

All in all, this was a fun piece to write, and it was also my first poem this year. As mentioned, it wasn’t intended to have any deep connection, but the final stanza might actually have some meaning to it.

 

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