She deserved it by Nora Smith
The opera:
A wild woman
free to roam.
A small-town sheriff
who’s never left home.
He falls in love
from afar with
the wild thing.
Chases and pleads
begs on his knees.
But she is a wild thing.
Kill me or leave me
but here I cannot stay.
My home is in freedom.
my life with the rivers
in the mountains
and plains.
I belong to the land
body and soul.
So, kill me or leave me
But here I cannot stay.
The gun goes off.
Her soul released.
Back on his knees
he bows his head
and weeps.
A group of
boys. Men
educated
and white.
“What did you think?”
Their reply seems to echo
across all of time
when the wild things come
And the guns go off;
“She deserved it.”
This poem tells a true story. This really happened and that is really what they said. If only she had listened, if only she had loved him, given up her entire self to be with him, knelt at his feet, and kissed his boots clean and lived a life, as his slave, and his wife. Why could she not be grateful for all he would allow her to have?
There will always be a justification for oppression, for violence, and control. If only he hadn’t resisted arrest; if only she hadn’t dressed so provocatively; if only they would just learn English.
May this time of struggle change our perspective. Make us aware of the injustices that many, if not most, of our fellow human beings have to deal with every day, in some form or another. We cannot change what we refuse to see. The world is changing, may we take this time to learn and grow and change along with it, and maybe, just maybe, make the world a better place along the way.