Mary, Mary, How Does Your Garden Grow?

Ever wonder what the purpose of those 'pretty maids all in a row' might be?

Mary, Mary, quite contrary 

How does your garden grow? 

With silver bells and cockleshells 

And pretty maids all in a row.

-- By Mother Goose

Mary, Mary, How Does Your Garden Grow?

Cobblestone paths ‘tween bowered vines…

Scents of jasmine and hyacinths…

Fragrant blooms of rose that climbs,

Creating those fairytale depths.

Birdsong lilting… just to entrance

‘Pon wing-ed flights of fancy trill.

Colorful feathered fairy dance

Drawing us to share the idyll. 

Mary, Mary, timid belle,

Delicately tends this garden

Of silver bells and cockle shell…

‘Pon shadowed paths inviting us down…

Beckoning now, she calls to you

To share her shadowed fears with her

That she might not walk alone through.

Join her there, against fear aver.

Many a pretty maid walks there

To bear her company awhile.

They step into her garden fair

And revel through each aisle.

Those pretty maids, all in a row,

Tramp into the garden smiling.

They dance and frolic, safe they trow,

In th’error of their beguiling.

In that garden smiling went well

Pretty maids someone should miss.

But none came out again to tell

The fate of idyllic promise.

Now… Mary, Mary, who can say

The reason for your timid tread,

On those oh so enticing pathways

Through this sylvan fairy flow'rbed?

Mary, Mary, why so wary

Walking your sunlit garden path

Where such flowers lovely tarry

And birds singing sweetly thou hath?

What darkness bides there in that glen?

If innocence is doomed… who’ll know?

Tell me Mary, Mary, what ken…

Tell us… How does your garden grow?

My deepest thanks to David Lewis Paget, Tate Morgan, and Rick Peutter for lending their guidance and tutelage to this composition.

by D. Denise Dianaty

Author's Note

Reviews

[barleygirl]

This is so well written, I'm stunned into silence for a moment (it won't last long)! I don't remember this nursery rhyme, but I don't want to relate your poem to a nursery rhyme . . . I want to savor your ongoing intrigue, thru-out, on its own merits. I love how you begin with a provocative question about the maids & your poem doesn't clear this up for me. I am left feeling these maids are a positive force, maybe angels or maybe Mary's own inner life force. Whatever is haunting her out in that flowerbed still remains a mystery & I love it! I love the subtlety of suggesting something & letting the reader's imagination run with it! (((HUGS))) Fondly, Margie

[MomzillaNC]

Thanks. This one was inspired by the Mother Goose rhyme, "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary"

Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells, and cockle shells,
And pretty maids all in a row.

[Einstein Noodle]

first i want to thank you for my new words of the day aver and trow ...Mother Goose rhymes rich in statements of the times ...the discussions over what is really meant are very interesting says i ... but the threads of Mary Mary tho in dispute are all fairly similar ... you have put a contemporary dark spin on it .. it is almost Holloween ;) i love your reading of it ..you have a bit too real of the maniac laugh :0 such a delicate, fine garden turned bloodthirsty ...snap dragons with teeth dripping blood .. maids frolic in and never come out .. Dracula is in hiding there ..i am sure of it ..well done ...for the classic language and form you could not have asked better for advice .. well done says i
E.

[MomzillaNC]

Thank you. I’m pleased you enjoyed my twisted nursery rhyme.

[Valkyrie Warrior]

Thank you very much for entering this wonderful poem in my contest!

[MomzillaNC]

Thank you. I hope you will enter my contest at http://www.writerscafe.org/contests/Boiled-In-Bat-Guano/50802/

[Valkyrie Warrior]

I will!!!!

[MomzillaNC]

I look forward to reading your submission(s)!

[Valkyrie Warrior]

:-D!!!!!!!.

[MomzillaNC]

I’ve added a spoken word recording to this post

[prince digbani]

Wow, a great poem. Loved it's flow.
recommended to any aching heart

[MomzillaNC]

Umm… IDK that I'd recommend a horror story to someone with an aching heart… :D

Thanks for reading.

[MomzillaNC]

I’ve added a spoken word recording to this post

[BClancy]

Wow, a very well written and pretty poem, turning very dark and sinister at the end. I really enjoyed it.

[MomzillaNC]

I’ve added a spoken word recording to this post

[TL Boehm]

I was going to say - I needed an eye cleanse after the haunting and killing as of late here on the WC - but this poem carries its own bit of foreshadowing there at the end. With a nod of course to those you mentioned - having read all three this is a poem of their caliber and talent - yet it is also uniquely you. BTW, not stalking you today - I just make it habit to eventually get caught up with RR's before I start posting a plethora of new work of my own.

[MomzillaNC]

Thank you.

I try to keep up with my RRs too, before posting more of my own stuff.

[MomzillaNC]

I’ve added a spoken word recording to this post

[therisa]

Often wonder, why today parents think nursery rhymes and faerie tales, are such innocent stories, given the darkness, which lays underneath. Filled with warnings, if a child or an adult should disobey, a social rule, or convention of the day. Guess, we can blame Disney and his studio, for sanitizing these old stories,
into their current form.

[MomzillaNC]

True enough -- Disney has sanitized many of the Grimm fairytales. This particular Nursery Rhyme, though, was never particularly dark -- that's all me! :D

Thanks.

[therisa]

Oops. Sorry, I got my high horse, Momzilla. Don't forget Hans Christian Andersen's "The Little Mermaid".

[MomzillaNC]

Oh, I didn't think you were on a "high horse." Disney has PC-ed those old terrifying tales. Cinderella, Snow White, The Little Mermaid, Aladin, and so many more… Those were not friendly little fairytales meant to entertain.

[therisa]

Thank you, Momzilla, I agree.

[MomzillaNC]

I’ve added a spoken word recording to this post

[jacob erin-cilberto]

you are quite good with form...and mixing the fantasy, fairy tale and real life with its darkness, innocence does die...from birth it is doomed...the environment around us shows us too many things that make us grow up too fast and become cynical.

nicely done.

[MomzillaNC]

Too very true. Thank you.

[MomzillaNC]

I’ve added a spoken word recording to this post

[Chris]

Read with interest... I remembered some words pronounce differently depending on use and meaning.

Minor flaws...and stumbles. I only mention it because you worked so hard to keep within your guides to not mention them would lessen your effort - I.E. :

"On those enticing pathways - 7
Through this sylvan fairy flowerbed?" - 9

and there IS more than just a syllabic count - your flow is thoughtful and a questing tale afterall.

[MomzillaNC]

Thank you. And thanks for pointing out that meter problem. I think I've fixed it.