Female Monster
Nice is overrated anyway.
Freya Carolyn
9/2/20261 min read
‘Character is fate; and damn, I’d better work on my character.’ Sylvia Plath.
How the female damsel beckons us. She sits and waits, crossed-legged; allows it all to happen.
‘Please, I don’t want to die.’ She says. Half-hearted; doesn’t really care.
The female monster arises from her ashes.
‘The female monster is hideous’. People shield their eyes, afraid of turning to stone.
She has gnarly claws, gangly limbs, and rotten teeth. The female monster is the one we cannot tame, the one we cannot defend.
So she shall meet her grisly fate.
Catherine Heathcliff must die. Her feelings are too strong, her patience too short. Oh! How she commands the Grange’s halls! How her shadow lurks in the corners of the Heights!
The female monster is bursting from every seam. Her passion floods the page; readers slam the book shut, hide it in the attic.
Pitchforks and stakes, the stench of burnt flesh. We march at noon; we capture the beast. She wails too loudly; the villagers toss and turn in their sleep. She is hungry and demands more; we have no more bodies to give.
How much the female monster wants! All that she does not need, yet she eats and eats and scours for more. If perhaps she could eat what was given, she would not be condemned to die. Female monster, you consume my nightmares.
Her character is selfish. There is no discipline, no humility. Perhaps we can purge the greed away, give birth to something more grateful. Accept it, settle with it, enjoy it. Don’t fight it, female monster, or you too will meet a grim fate.