My grandmother prays for me
I,
pause
My mother’s warm embrace,
Mother, I sin
The sheep communicate
They play
And the eyes of black wolves
Watch as they graze
They pray,
The birds drone in
Prayers at the altar for more blessings
Sheep are benevolent
Asking to sin, and sin
Bleeds into the wool
Red, sunken teeth
The hunt is gathering
We kill and we eat
Mother, I’ve sinned
I’ve killed a heart before
And I’ve tasted the flesh of my skin
I pray, every night
My grandmother tells me
That there’s a Devil in yawning
And I smile
At her, a sheep
When I was a few years younger
I sinned
I, along with my friends, like sheep
Ostracized a poor girl,
Who stepped with the wrong foot
And smiled with forgiveness
Mother, I’m afraid
Afraid of eating another human again
I fear the bed because when I close my eyes
I see a witchhunt
And in my dreams, which I pray that I forget,
I see, and watch,
And it’s pain and hurt
What did she feel?
Wolves hunt because they have hunger,
Grandmother, I won’t wake from this bed
I’ll close all the doors
And I’ll surround myself with comforters
Mother, I am tired
Please don’t worry about me
It hurts already
Just let me sleep now
Softly
Comments
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ian.ian
i think i'm absolutely in love with your writing style and the way you convey emotions. i felt a huge discomfort reading this.
from what i understood, this poem deconstructs that orthodox/religious image of sheeps being entirely "pure and innocent" and puts into perspective sheeps as sinners, maybe in a even worse condition than wolves [that are hunting because they have hunger].
that's the analysis on a surface level tho. the most interesting part to me is how you portrayed the violence. how the friends - the flock of sheep - ostracized her [from what i can see, they bullied her] and, ultimately, killed her emotionally. actually, maybe that even led to her demise...? that would give the narrator's suffering an even more powerful guilt.
the sin that is, also, slowly killing the guilty sheep.
i truly hope i got most of it right [and sorry if i,, mistook everything, LOL]!! and again, i'm absolutely in love with your writing. thank you for blessing the today's blog section with such a beautiful poem!!!
hello! thank you so much for the kind words. I'm very glad you enjoyed reading and feeling emotion for my poem! And yes you are quite correct! I wanted to subvert the idea of sheeps symbolising innocence when they can also be expressed as subjects of compliance, bullying, and groups that sin and are peer pressured to sin. In some way, they can be more crueler than wolves, who naturally hunt for their predatory instinct. and compare that to the sheep's behaviour which instead actively acts and are totally aware of what they're doing. And I think that highlights how depraved a person's soul can get.
And yes you are correct, there's guilt in the memory of grouping up and bullying someone. There is suffering in knowing that you've done wrong. In some way I like to imagine that the victim was hunted by predatory sheeps, and she was a poor victim to their harassment resulting in isolation.
I also wanted to layer religious symbolism to create the idea that the person looks for forgiveness in God. So they view their own past actions as "sins" that ought to be corrected. Unintentionally, I can also see a connection in how God is perceived to be a shepherd that guide's the sheeps and the many stories of humans sinning and rejecting God's guidance.
I'm glad you enjoyed the poem and hope you have a wonderful day/night! may your pillows be cold!
by Maddox; (edited); Report