The Thinning Veil:

Where the Natural Meets the Unnatural World

Gretel, in Darkness

Louis Glück, The House on Marshland (1975)

This is the world we wanted.
All who would have seen us dead
are dead. I hear the witch’s cry
break in the moonlight through a sheet
of sugar: God rewards.
Her tongue shrivels into gas . . .

Now, far from women’s arms
and memory of women, in our father’s hut
we sleep, are never hungry.
Why do I not forget?
My father bars the door, bars harm
from this house, and it is years.

No one remembers. Even you, my brother,
summer afternoons you look at me as though
you meant to leave,
as though it never happened.
But I killed for you. I see armed firs,
the spires of that gleaming kiln–

Nights I turn to you to hold me
but you are not there.
Am I alone? Spies
hiss in the stillness, Hansel,
we are there still and it is real, real,
that black forest and the fire in earnest.

Disintegration

Jeannine Hall Gailey, Flare, Corona (2023)

At the end of the world, I sat in the dark waiting for you,
but you didn’t come. You didn’t save me.

At the end we are always alone, candles slowly
burning out, losing the flame for lack of oxygen.

You didn’t tell me it would be like this. All of it
came back to me so clearly, shadows on the walls

playing out scenes from my childhood, from our wedding,
from days when I was full of hope. Every tree I planted,

every animal I ever loved. I wasn’t as weak as I thought.
There was enough for this. The waves rolled in and out

at midnight, and there was a wild wind. I thought: I will
go out with the wind. Under my feet the ground was shifting.

I couldn’t feel my feet. The stars were bright but there was no
moon. I was alone, and the night air smelled like salt and smoke.

I couldn’t bear to say goodbye anyway. I could have sworn
there were daffodils, the green and yellow, the sap of spring,

though I knew it was November. Your mind plays tricks.
I could hear the band playing, something like The Cure,

and people dancing. And that wind. It could have blown me away.

Poppies in October

Slyvia Plath, Ariel (1965)

Even the sun-clouds this morning cannot manage such skirts.
Nor the woman in the ambulance
Whose red heart blooms through her coat so astoundingly –
A gift, a love gift
Utterly unasked for
By a sky
Palely and flamily
Igniting its carbon monoxides, by eyes
Dulled to a halt under bowlers.
Oh my God, what am I
That these late mouths should cry open
In a forest of frosts, in a dawn of cornflowers.

Prompts:

Choose a seasonally-related sight—the leaves turning, a pumpkin farm, an unusual bird that visits, or like Sylvia, perhaps a bright dahlia almost done with blooming.
Choose an otherworldly presence—God, a ghost, a mythological character, to address.
Choose a question.

Write a poem using these prompts, perhaps in the theme and tone of “Poppies.”

Introduction to Teen Witchcraft

Jeannine Hall Gailey, Field Guide to the End of the World (2016)

Always these young women in search of power,
their eyes rolled back in their heads, midriffs exposed.
Always some girl with a candle in a dark room –
and poof, her face brightens as she achieves
some moment of bliss. The raindrops around her freeze

in midair, the wolves stop baring their fangs, and for a moment
the young girl marvels at her own invincibility.
But then it’s fire, fire, always someone with a stake or a knife
ready to do her in. She is a spark about to go out.

Introduction to Teen Girl Vampires

Jeannine Hall Gailey, Field Guide to the End of the World (2016)

turn feral while defending their human boyfriends,
harmless and blond in Varsity jackets and crewcuts.
These girls just want to be loved, and fed,

in that order, and can we blame them? A nurse
here or there won’t be missed, or the guy playing
“second policeman.” Bram Stoker equated blood and sex,

Mina chaste and clever while hunting her Dracula down,
his bite awaking impulses that ignited and were ignored.
These days, teen vampire girls enjoy sex

with abandon, tossing lovers around like tree limbs.
These days, the girl doesn’t succumb to the monster,
she is the monster, teeth gleaming in the moonlight,

coquettish limbs and curls masking superpowers.
Oh, she still wants to be the prettiest girl at the prom,
and perhaps she mourns some future idea

of motherhood. But men line up for the promise
of her bite, her blood. And she has nothing to fear;
she cannot be broken, tarnished by age, her heart

impenetrable to anything except for that wooden stake.

Exercise:

Write an “introduction to” poem concerning your favorite Halloween monster, zombie, witch, etc. Feel free to reference at least one pop culture trope. Try to use the word list you made earlier in class.

Extra reading for “Thinning the Veil”

Louise Gluck’s Meadowlands
Margaret Atwood’s Morning in the Burned House
Christina Rossetti’s Goblin Market (if in the mood for something more Victorian)
And of course, anything by Edgar Allen Poe