Story of the Copper Haired Girl Part II

The breeze came down

from the topmost spire

and wrapped its arms around her,

sweeping her along and up the stairs.

There on the topmost step,

with the great bronze angel 

looming up on high,

she stood and looked at the figures 

carved in white marble.

---

And then she wasn’t sure

whether they came down to her

or whether she went up to them

for suddenly they were all around her,

birds chattering and clucking, cooing and whistling,

warbling, trilling, tweeting, cheeping and chirping,

and in the waves at her feet water snakes

and eels and fish with fine scales

and crabs and lobsters scittered and slithered

and wiggled and swam in the water

delighted at the new-found world

their Creator had just given them.

---

He spread wide his arms and animals of all kinds

began to roam the earth.

The buffalo snorted and stamped

on the ground with their hoofs,

the horses raced whinnying in groups

along the beach to the ocean,

tiger and lion prowled the jungle,

camels wondered why they had two humps

as giraffes stretched out their long necks

to browse on the trees.

Wolves trotted along the plain,

antelopes and mountain goats

clambered over the rocks.

---

And He, the Creator, stood at one side

smiling down at his creatures 

while the two neighboring angels 

whispered together and sent sidelong glances

at the little girl with copper colored hair

and with a tiny green frog

perched on her shoulder

who had suddenly

appeared out of nowhere.

---

What in the world is that, they asked.

She doesn’t have feathers, or wings like us.

She doesn’t have scales or swim in the water.

And they whispered together and thought

they would wait and see

just how she fitted into the picture

as she crossed the threshold and floated, 

dancing, down the aisle,

with a host of other creatures in her wake.

---

Behind the scenes, since you’ve asked

It was probably 1972 or 73 and I was teaching art history, so-called baby art, at Gonzaga in Florence. When summer came I invited several students  to come stay with me in Orvieto and one lovely girl was to help me out in the craft shop I had at the time. We became good friends and I eventually visited her in Baltimore where I also  met her small daughter Charlotte. One of the gifts I brought for her were a couple of small green wooden frogs made by the  Michelangeli workshop. Subsequently I wrote the Story for Charlotte about the frogs.

Much much later, seeking an idea for a post, I chanced on the story and turned it into A Story for a Copper-Haired Little Girl.