This will be my submission for the Storybook Collab. Since origionaly pitching the idea to Rea I have been wantingto submit something, but never found what I wanted to place into the collab. I have now. This peice was edited by two english teachers with Masters Degrees. The peice was previously published by the award winning school mag Finesse. Please enjoy.

NO DEADLINE SET AT THIS TIME. PLEASE CHECK BACK IN THE NEAR FUTURE TO SEE IF MY ARTIST GOT OFF HIS LAZY ASS TO DO HIS WORK. Kidding, but in all seriousness, he is very bussy and it will take some time for the work to get done. I am looking at 2-4 months as a ROUGH guess at this time.

Writer: Trevor Wiles
Artwork: Matt [Link to profile]
VA: Tomamoto [Link to profile] [Link to sample]
*Thankyou so much mate. He did the VA within 3 hours after I first approached him.
Reference: This peice takes place in 1860. This is the year when Lincoln first becomes a major figure in society and slavery is approaching its end. The scene is in the deep south and the girl is a rich plantation owner's daughter. This is her 16th birthday. Or so it goes.

Listen now if you would:

Womanhood - 1860

The sun soaks two great arches,
As a girl blossoms after many Marches.
Today, on her sixteenth year,
Womanhood finally draws near.
This, the day that a gown is adorned,
And a daughter is dearly warned:

"The world is a dangerous place, my dear,
So I ask of you to always stay near,
Until, that is, another man takes your hand
Before both the cloth and the land."

A grand band of no less than ten plays upon marble stairs,
As a young girl walks upon a stage lined with numerous chairs.
Walking, shaking, step by step, into her birthright.
Yet, adorned in jewels and gown, she is quite the steady sight.

The sun now blazes high in the clear sky
Turning her blushed face to the past, she waves goodbye.
For, as her gentle step reaches the center of the affair,
The countless guests, of much prestige gaze and stare.

The minutes seem to melt slowly as the event moves along.
The rituals, then the blessing: both move on and end in song.
A group of Sirens stand upon two high balconies, calling,
And on the floor stands a newly made woman, crying.

The tears run down her slender face in great amount
As she clings to the lingering memory of the Knight on the mount.
Not a fortnight ago, a man of great stature and might stole her heart:
Stole it because he had no right to it from the start.

Born of modest birth, the man could never pursue a woman of wealth.
However, a girl of no heir or wealth of her own is free to any man of health.
So when the eve to the end of her adolescence came, she wrote her love in stone.
To this man, a man with no name, she gave the greatest prize - her virgin groan.

Now, surrounded by men and women of unimaginable wealth, she sees a ghost.
There, alone in the garden, is her dear Knight. She runs to him, from the echo of the great toast.
The sky has darkened and the air has chilled as night begins to take its course.
Then, a scream followed by a great thunder, so loud, that none shall know the source.

What the young woman's eyes gaze upon would mortify,
And the feeling that she lives then would cause even the most sound to fortify.
Her taker is not standing upon the floor as all men do - his feet float up, off the ground.
His dark-skinned face is cold; the tenderness of his hand - gone. From a tree, his neck is bound.

Just as her knees go to give out, and her heart as well,
A stern hand is placed upon her shoulder -- It's her father; she can tell.

"My dear, this 'little accident' shall never be lived within my name.
Believe me when I say I could never allow such shame."

The words uttered in secrecy bend within the woman's ears.
The image she pictures becomes the worst of her fears.
Her own father stabbed her in the heart,
Making her forever a love lost tart.

The wind of the ghastly night peaks, and the band stops playing.
The transcendence is complete as the pendulum stops swaying.
For no more than a second, silence never breaks,
And, when broken, a generation knows what womanhood takes.