Poetry · Chapter
I explained
A stark, poetic address to a small, sickly girl named Elena, whose shrunken limbs and ample sex contrast with her youth.
What happens
A stark, poetic address to a small, sickly girl named Elena, whose shrunken limbs and ample sex contrast with her youth. The poem reflects on her theft of her mother's atrophied smile and the dignity she attains despite her illness and tender age of two and a half.
Themes in this chapter
The Body and Mortality
The poem dwells on Elena's frail, shrunken body, her illness (tuberculous), and the juxtaposition of her tiny form with the dignity of her suffering, highlighting mortality and physical decay.
Childhood and Innocence
Elena is only two and a half years old, yet she is described with sexualized and morbid imagery, subverting conventional innocence and presenting a corrupted or premature awareness.
Characters to notice
- Elena
The central figure of the poem, a small girl with shrunken limbs and ample sex, who has filched her mother's smile and lies on a counter-pane, observed in her illness.
Key passages
“Small Elena Of shrunken limbs And ample sex Who Having filched The atrophied Woman-smile of your mother Scatter it On the eating unseen Tuberculous Inaudible hands On the counter-pane”
Little Elena, with your wasted limbs and oversized sexuality, you have stolen your mother's withered smile and spread it across the bedspread with your invisible, tuberculosis-ridden hands.
The poem opens with a shocking image of a sickly child possessing a mature sexuality and stealing her mother's smile, blending innocence with decay.
“It might have been Impossible Fingers should be so long Being so tiny But Nature Needing no microscope In her laboratory Found it just as easy Marshalling imperceptible Hosts To bone of your arm Among overlapping of lint Attaining a dignity Unworthy of your years Two and a half!”
It seems impossible that such tiny fingers could be so long, but nature, without needing a microscope, finds it just as simple to assemble invisible armies to the bone of your arm amidst bandages, achieving a dignity that is inappropriate for your age of two and a half.
The poem marvels at the paradox of Elena's long fingers on her tiny body, attributing it to nature's effortless creation, and concludes that her suffering grants her a dignity beyond her years.