Reanimated Lavender Granola Switchblade Nun rides again.

Sunday, August 2, 2009

Folie A Deux



Everyone deserves to be happy

Including you,

My peach.


So if you want to bring your Sweet Jane around,

That's fine.

That's jussssst

Fine.


In fact,

If you like her so much

Why don't you marry her?


Oh.

There is that.


I do try, you know--

To keep myself up...

To make myself attractive to you...

But,

When you padlock the door like that,

I can't get to the salon.


And oh,

Let one measly set of drapes catch fire

And everybody's twitchy for a week.

I was only trying

To let some daylight in.

I was only trying

To snap everybody out of their comas

And that tiresome English reserve.


Go ahead,

Have your little schoolmarm.

I could probably even do something with this attic;

I've begun by

Embossing your wedding invitations

On the wall

With my fingernails.


Can't we please be friends?

If I smile and extend my hand,

Would you waltz me just this once

For old time's sake again?


Oh, darling,

Look at me!

I don't know how I got here, on the roof!

Behold my charity,

My forgiveness, and my love--

The last you'll ever see.

____________

32 comments:

  1. we can't always be friends.... after....

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  2. "Something in the Eyre." Love that.

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  3. Sometimes over is over ... friendship should be the beginning not the end

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  4. Hmm. I love this one, but if it's coming from your own personal experience, then I don't love it so much. I want you HAPPY!

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  5. Um, gang? You're all very sweet, but this poem is spoken in character. It isn't me speaking, but Bertha Antoinette Mason, the madwoman in the attic in "Jane Eyre", the first Mrs. Rochester. Yes, I modernized it a bit, with the mention of the salon, but still, it isn't meant to be a metaphor for my own life. As yet, no one has found it necessary to lock me up in the attic for fear I'll burn the house down. I just tried to imagine how she might feel and what she might say.

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  6. I feel silly. Of course I see it now. I think I read Jane Eyre 30 years ago and I think of the 1st Mrs. Rochester as Bertha. Your interpretation of her thought process is spot on.

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  7. I'm glad I was not the first commenter. Now I can say I knew it all along...ha,ha.

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  8. Awesome, awesome stuff. Loved this!

    Cxx

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  9. Aha .. never knew Mrs R's name was Bertha .. how did I miss that?

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  10. Oh Dear Jane...your sweetness be my peach, your jealousy my window to the eyes that house your soul...

    great update...

    You just have to know you are so adored!!!

    G

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  11. I think reading the comments was nearly as entertaining as the poem.

    Glad to know you're not stuck in teh attic.

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  12. Attics are overrated unless someone is hiding fitch!

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  13. Love it! Makes me want to read Jane Eyre again (if I ever read it in the first place).

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  14. I have read both Jane Eyre and The Wide Sargasso Sea and hence the connotations came easily. may be I'll ask my students to look this up for their answers/papers.fabulously done.

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  15. Such an interesting (and vastly misunderstood) literary character to choose. I love the biting sarcasm and wit that you have given her, showing a far more sentient creature than she is made out to be in the novel.

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  16. Brilliant! Love it...and I'm so thankful no one has tricked me into going up those attic stairs ;-)

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  17. Awesome! Jane Eyre modernization! Go Fireblossom!

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  18. Glad I found out who it was about! Definitely an 'anti-love' poem.

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  19. Ok...I admit would have never pulled that one out without reading your instruction manual in the comments...nonetheless was mesmerized at the apparent lunacy that wasnt lunatic at all. This would play well as a monologue for a one woman show, had a stranglehold on me from the first couple of lines....loved it.

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  20. I've read Jane Eyre many times over the years, so I did know who was speaking these wonderful lines, Shay. Well done.
    K

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  21. I always thought Mrs. Rochester was a lot like some other crazy women I have known, perfectly happy painting her cheeks with her gruel and ranting quietly to herself while screwing up everybody else's life just by being alive--who knew she had these hidden resentments and a capacity to feel? I have close relatives who would think their work was done if they could destroy other peoples' happiness that efficiently.

    But I digress--you made me think, wench--with this very sharp little knife of a poem from inside the madwoman's head (loved the wedding invitations embossed on the walls, in fact..loved every word.)

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  22. Talk about the mad woman in the attic! This one certainly packs a punch.

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  23. I enjoyed this so much that, if I were a rich patron, you would immediately stop work and would re-write all of Jane Eyre YOUR way - much more entertaining! Your madwoman is a lot more interesting (and relatable) than the original. LOVE the fingernails on the wall touch - that is a New Thought (now monkeys on the other side of the world will start doing it:-))

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  24. I love this Jane...she speaks what surely must have been in her mind...this is awesome!!

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  25. You have simply outdone yourself here, my poetic friend! Bertha Mason has never been so vivid. It was the t- shirt photo that got me first, and then I proceeded to your WONDERFULLY FABULOUS and FABULOUSLY WONDERFUL creation. I am not prone to hyperbole, so you know this was really, really good!!!

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  26. it is disappointing to see that you have maintained such a high level of brilliance in your writing for so long... i was hoping...i mean i was afraid that you would burn out quickly and start writing crap like the rest of us.

    {{shuffling away, shoulders hunched, muttering under my breath "bitch just won't help out less fortunate writers. not very charitable of her..."}}

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  27. That was 100% in character. You've done Charlotte Bronté proud!

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  28. "that's jussssssssst fine." ha ha ... if a woman uses THAT many s's ... it's a dead giveaway. Enjoyed this and I LOVE the book and ALL the movies.. :) ... my husband groans when he walks in a room and I'm watching the "slowest movie on earth" according to him. :)

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Spirit, what do you wish to tell us?