We used to fight about who got to be Miss Scarlet.
She was the most beautiful character on the box,
her slender waist, her long black hair, her scarlet lips.
Her slender waist. It was as if we thought that by moving
a red plastic piece around the board, we, too,
would be more beautiful. With a roll of the dice,
she would glide across the square tiles from the library
to the billiard room, would take the underground tunnel
between the conservatory and the lounge.
As I filled in the squares on my brown detective pad,
I imagined long red acrylics on my stubby broken nails.
Oh she was everything we were not. She was mysterious,
she hung out in a mansion with a ballroom and study.
She was elegant, thin and rich. And when things went wrong,
and they always did, she and her friends, Miss Peacock, Mrs. White,
they always figured it out by the end of the game
just who had been the killer, and what weapon they used—
the silver candlestick, the knife.
Did we really believe that beauty would help us
to figure things out? We decided at some point
to try that route. The game gathered dust
as we turned to stealing our mother’s make up
and styling each other’s hair, then watching
our weight, then not eating at all.
We were our own killers then. Our own weapons, too.
We didn’t need a revolver or a rope. It was Miss Scarlet
in the kitchen, but it took years for us to figure it out.
I was returned to this poem by re-listening to Episode 6, of Emerging Form. I coulda swore I commented on this poem. I’m surprised to see I didn’t. Surprised, further, that no one did/has. *sigh* And so it goes.
Once again, sistren and brethren, Behold the power of poetry. So incredibly much is distilled into these twenty-seven lines. Such a myriad of meanings, interpretations. And such a necessary subject. Once again, this is another of your poems worthy to take, line-by-line, examining its words and what they’re saying, what they’re implying, what might me inferred. To be present to its sorcery.
I’ve just signed up for a workshop that will be co-facilitated by Pam Houston; and “Clue” reminds me so precisely much of her essay from Patricia Foster’s, _Minding the Body: Women Writers on Body and Soul_, “Out of Habit, I Start Apologizing.
http://medhum.med.nyu.edu/view/408
How grateful and glad to have been returned to, “Clue.”
A bouquet of kiitos for continuing to come, for continuing to stay.
Brightest blessings. Onward and omward.
This makes me so happy, this note. Thank you, dear Eduardo, for listening to emerging form! For considering the poem so closely. For your kind words. And for being so very you. Big hugs to you,