A free-form poem that explores Ophelia’s madness in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and makes some guesses as to what drove her to her downfall. Written at Northeastern University in 2010, revised in 2011 for the Greater Boston Intercollegiate Poetry Festival. I read this at my first ever poetry reading last week :)
Ophelia was crazy.
I’m not saying she heard voices or anything,
but the girl was a listener.
She listened to her daddy
and listened around corners.
She listened to her man
when he said, “Get thee to
the abortion clinic. I don’t
really think we’re ready for
this kind of responsibility.”
She listened to the branches snap
and the rushing of the water.
Water in her lungs,
and a bridal bouquet of
green willow and Gypsophila paniculata
in her arms.
Rue in her belly.
Gypsophila, Gypsy Ophelia,
baby’s breath.
She would have been
an unsuitable mother.
There was something rotten
in her mind.
Just past
her big doe eyes,
her beautiful name,
her often depicted
(and where do we get this idea?)
long, flowing, wavy hair,
was a woman who behaved
very much
like the crackhead outside the gas station.
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