Ice Lilies
A Fairy Tale
by
Pamela Bruns
March was out of season, or the season was out of March. The August corn had ripened with juicy bursts of summer sun. Pumpkins grew round bellied in soft tilled earth. Scarecrows danced. Ghosts stretched themselves thin with dreams of rustling leaves. March sighed angrily. For eleven long months she waited, and then was forgotten, washed away with April showers. She only cared for February, for people often hated February and spent all four of those lonely weeks pining for March. March was a bit cunning, often tricksy, and not very dependable. Some years she favored the North Wind, some years the South. Some years she clothed herself in ice, some years in rain.
But this year, she wanted something different, something new. She wanted to be noticed, adored, revered.
The four seasons were very wary of March’s behavior and took due precautions against her antics. It was not her fickle nature that disturbed them. March could do as she pleased, with one foot in winter and one in spring, it was rightly expected. It was March’s self-love that made them wary.
The four winds were anciently weary and gathered together to discuss what to do about March. It was a tempestuous meeting, full of sighs, moans, and great gusts of emotion. But in the end, things settled down, and the West Wind was called upon to teach March a lesson.
At the same time, deep in the Appalachian mountains, a young family was building a home. It was a beautiful home, with many windows, facing north, south, east, and west. The youngest children were twins, a boy and a girl. One day, in late September, the wind around the mountain stopped. Everything was still and deeply silent. The boy and the girl stopped their games and listened. They heard their breathing, they heard fire crackling, they heard nothing else. The deep silence lasted days. No one noticed. But the boy and the girl knew, and they held their breath and waited. March was unaware of the Meeting of the Winds. Her pride and self-love had grown to such proportions that she seldom noticed anything at all.
The West wind was well equipped to deal with March’s pride. Her hardened heart and selfishness might bring the divine locust, and the West Wind knew all the dangers that came with that. He accepted his job with great seriousness.
March was in a frigid temper when the West Wind swept in. Turned in upon herself she needed a tornadic spin to unravel her thoughts. She looked at the West Wind warily. The West Wind’s great ancient voice boomed through March’s days. She flipped herself back together and looked haughty. “West, why have you come? Are you here to mock me with your unbound self?”
West sighed the noise of rustling pines. “March, it’s time for you to be yourself. The patience of the other Winds has eroded. The seasons are most annoyed. The eleven months are ashamed.
March flicked her head in annoyance. A shower of ice and crocuses tumbled down. The West Wind wrapped March up in his powerful strength. “March, be yourself. Be who you are called to be, dancing on the border of winter and spring.”
March, in a furious rage spewed hailstones. The West Wind spun in a flurry of power, and carried March across the plains, across the mountains. The boy and girl sitting on the porch suddenly stood in anticipation. The branches above them creaked furiously, the windows rattled. A September squall thunder-drummed on vine-thick pumpkins.
The door slammed behind them as they ran to the bedroom and looked out the west window.
The West Wind saw their innocent faces in the window panes. The idea swirled in him so thick that March might have guessed if she wasn’t so furious. The West Wind bowed low to the window and gently deposited March between the two window panes.
“March, you are loved, but you must find your true self.”
Silence filled the air.
March was stunned. She rattled the window pane. She screamed her most icy scream. The children giggled. There was icy glory between the window panes. They traced the patterns with their fingers and spent the afternoon making paper snowflakes.
March twisted upon herself like she had twisted so many tree trucks. She blew her most self-righteous puff. Boy and Girl looked in the window pane every day finding new delights.
Slowly March thawed. Their innocent faces worked into her hardened spirit. Every night, March dreamed up new delights to enthrall them. Between the panes, ice patterns would build daydreams. Boy and Girl found ice-sugared visions of desperate delicate beauty. Kites surged through bare tree tracked skies. Great Horned Owlets peeped their newness toward a warmer future. Green moss crept cautiously, carefully around the corners between glass and ice and a thawing heart.
In the stillness of late March, March sighed. He was there, the Eternal One; on the day she had forgotten, because it only graced her occasionally, so delicately, powerfully: too much potency for one month to hold steady. He graced March with his resurrection power. And she saw herself. Undone. Chastened. Obedient. How had she dared, when the Ancient One stepped back into his creation through her days?
That morning Boy and the Girl saw lilies between the window panes. It was the last gift March would give them, the little innocent ones. But she would always love them.
Fall turned to Winter. March’s pride shrunk inside herself, and she found it quite easy to leave her window pane prison. The West Wind poured over the mountains and blew March across the valley. The crocuses were especially nice that year.
Ice Lilies, A Fairy Tale: Copyright 2025 by Pamela Bruns. All rights reserved.
darklybrightpress.com 