Imprison
A poem inspired by our dear Jane Eyre
Trapped wide in
her murky Sargasso
sea of thoughts—
perhaps there is
a bit of madness
in everyone.
Like Antoinette,
am I committed to
a third floor
room of MY own?
Who is my personal
Rochester
snatching my breath
as I look in the mirror
and glimpse my soul?
Many Eyre
on the side of caution
as our young protagonist
Miss Jane did—
But please remind me
It’ll take
just one candle
to burn
the whole damn
house down.
To give this poem context, when I penned this six years ago, I was imagining the Jane Eyre-inspired novel, Wide Sargasso Sea, written by Jean Rhys in 1966, nearly 120 years after Jane Eyre’s debut. Basically, Rhys’ novel reimagined the story of the “silenced” madwoman in the attic from Eyre’s novel, Rochester’s wife Bertha as “Antoinette,” the tragic Creole heiress who was thought to have gone mad. The novel explored themes of patriarchy, colonialism, and madness, and is considered a masterpiece of feminist literature as it gives voice to a silenced character from a classic novel.
‘)