the deliverer Flashcards
‘deliverer’ ambiguity
the birth mother
the religious deliverer (from evil)
the geographic deliverer
setting of the convent
restriction or religious liberation
paradise, refuge
female confinement
use of lists
+ use of triples
clinical, disconnected
reflect the widespread of this issue, the speaker is not the first nor the last, the shock value is only for the disconnected reader - not for those who experience it within these societies
animalistic imagery with the children
dehumanisation of the babies
reflecting view by society
and reflects the dependance of babies, pack animal of “dog”
“found,,, covered,,, stuffed,,, abandoned”
life happening to her
dependance of children, innocence of babies
that is not always recognised by the corrupt in society (not the mother, but the society around her)
OUR LADY OF THE LIGHT CONVENT, KERALA
creates a clinical tone to the poem versus the story of someones real life
“The sister here is telling my mother”
lack of biological family emphasized by the diversion of sister to mean nun rather than familial sister
“They are American so they know about ceremony
And tradition, about doing things right.”
questioning if the american way is the right way to do things
caesura and enjambment reflecting the displacemnet / delivering, fitting into a different kind of life
They haven’t seen or touched her yet.
Don’t know of her fetish for plucking hair off hands,
Or how her mother tried to bury her.
very regular form (no caesure, enjambment or short/long lines)
reflecting the fitting into new lifestyle- the normality of her new life versus the difference of the transition
reflects how her life is not normal but her experience is
“fetish”
perversion of the daughter and the parents
questioning the american parents right to take the daughter away
fine line between love and perversion/exploitation
pronouns
seperate the parents, the americans, the nuns, the mother from the girl
she is in between all her experiences, she doesnt fit in anywhere but neither does anyone we are all moulded and made by our experiences
But they are crying.
We couldn’t stop crying, my mother said,
new line in stanza and caesura reflecting the divide between they and we and my
Sees how she’s passed from woman
To woman. She returns to twilight corners.
“woman // to woman”
raised by women
each women changed her symbolised by the changing of the line
Where mothers go to squeeze out life,
perverted / gross description of birth and delivery
as something of extraction rather than delivering
Trudge home to lie down for their men again.
presents the mother as no longer being a villain, but rather a victim who suffered in her society as much as her daughter for being abandoned
and calling for change in helping the mothers not just the daughters, criticising the exclusive and performative activism that can occur in these situations
Feel for penis or no penis,
Toss the baby to the heap of others,
widespread of the issue
the violence of misogyny, and how it saved the speaker from a life of the same fate of her mothers
normal form reflects the normalcy of this beyond the world, except the
