bye bye *sad face* Lamb to the Slaughter by Celestina Wei [STUDENT]

 

By meticulously extracting words from the short story, “Lamb to the Slaughter,” by Roald Dahl, I created a found poem to highlight one of the two conflicts engraved into the short story. The conflict I selected is the conflict between our protagonist, Mary Maloney, and her husband, Patrick Maloney. This is a man vs man conflict, person vs person, with the antagonist, Patrick wishing to leave the protagonist, Mary, but Mary craving for Patrick to stay with her. This conflict covers the first few pages of the short story. (The other conflict is about Mary Maloney hiding Patrick’s body, but that is irrelevant.)

I know it’s an external conflict here, because it’s honestly just one desire vs another desire–one person’s goal, vs another person’s goal. It’s not a clique of people, let alone society–cannot be a person vs society conflict. There is no mention of the world outside, so it’s not a man vs nature type of conflict. Our protagonist isn’t debating on whether or not she should kill Patrick or not–so it’s not really an internal conflict, a man vs self conflict. What Patrick wants, is what she doesn’t want. Essentially, they are fighting. (This story is also not a science fiction short story, nor a story with the supernatural.)

In the story, the plot follows with Patrick proposing his idea of  leaving Mary, to Mary’s utter disbelief and shock–resulting into her depriving the life of Patrick. A few lines in the poem, I had highlighted in red. I highlighted it in red, as to signify danger, as to signify Mary’s turning point. The selected words are meant to be creepier–they are meant to stand out as well. The color slowly turns darker and darker, because the story proceed in a dark direction as Mary vehemently chooses to end the life of Patrick. I shrank some of the words, to have it appear as if Mary’s words are weak. People’s voice will sound rather weak when they are upset, when they are crying,–that sort of thing. The lighter words are meant to have less impact, in comparison to the words I’ve bolded. The skinnier the words, the less impact I want for them to have–the more weak and feeble I’m aiming for. The bolder the words, the more impact I am looking for, I am looking for more power behind it all. I want more of an impact from those words. The bigger, the stronger. The smaller, the weaker. All of this, is to indicate our protagonist’s emotions.

For the conflict in the story is about how one wishes to leave while the other yearns for that person to stay, I incorporated the idea of the door, and how the door was coherently “slammed shut” by the other. The protagonist of the story, wishes to open the door, but she cannot, because the door has been “locked.” Then, to match with it all, I put a door in the background, with a hand reaching out to match with my door concept.

Now, for the words. I selected the words from throughout the entire story, from the beginning to the end, to highlight the conflict between these two characters. Unfortunately, some words I sought were not in the story, forcing me to use synonyms of said word. To highlight the conflict, I chose to begin with that door, slamming. I then fall into details of how Mary Maloney felt for a bit–which I could’ve elaborated more if I added something along the lines of how much she cares for Patrick, but that’ll cause for the conflict I want to highlight to be harder to see through the text.

I wasn’t just aiming for representing the conflict in the story, I was also into reflecting the protagonist’s emotions within the story–leading to her paroxysm. I wanted to say that her emotions pointing towards the conflict were herculean, with her slowly just turning to a point where she just “breaks apart.” I wanted to write it in a way where it lead to the climax of this conflict. I want readers to feel the character’s desperation, the character’s grief as this conflict spurs up. I don’t just want to state the conflict, I also want for the reader to understand how this conflict is affecting the character.

 

“The door, slamming.” –> Someone wants to leave. Someone shut the door on you.

“I couldn’t feel anything at all.” –> Our protagonist’s emotions. How they feel, the emptiness that overcomes them in result of the intensity of the grief. 

“Your back turned to me, ” ‘Goodnight.’ ” ” –> Meaning, that the protagonist is left by Patrick. The “goodnight” is a cheap “goodbye” (except there wasn’t any goodbye’s in the short story.)

“I’m staring down into the leg of a lamb.” –> The leg of a lamb is the tool that is utilized to kill Patrick. As presented from before, our protagonist feels empty on the inside. Empty, she’s staring at a lamb’s leg. Now, a lamb’s leg is quite the spontaneous object to stare at, therefore, it just reflects on the grief, while also contributing to her “turning point” that I want to highlight.

“Grief. Horror. Nausea.” –> Simple emotions to clear it, simple emotions to state to indicate it.

“I could’ve cried, cried the heart I had out.” –> Our protagonist is so distraught, that she can’t even spark a tear. She’s turning weaker, feebler, as this grief overcomes her.

“You want to run away from me,” –> States the antagonist’s desire.

“You cannot.” –> States our protagonist’s conflicting desire.

“I won’t allow you to.” –> A hint of possession, a hint of obsessive love–which leads to the later-on murder.  It also shows that this character is obdurate to allow the other to leave.

“Please… don’t go away.” –> She’s desperate. She wants him to stay. She’s begging him to.

“Stay. With me.” –> Simple words, in a more commanding-like tone. Asking him to stay with her, asking for him to be with her.

“Patrick please–all the time, be with Mary Maloney and your child,” –> Begging yet again.

“I want us… to be us.” –> A small, meek and feeble line said by our protagonist, restating her want and desire.

“Can I, open the door?” –> A question, asking whether or not they can get back together or not.

“No?” –> Broken, confusion, a display and array of emotions in one word, yet finalizing our character’s turning point, knowing that there is nothing she can do.