Unit 8aSection 4 aExercise 13 aOrigins of Abusiveness

We encountered Sharon Olds in Unit 2. Olds' poems are often described as 'physical.' That is, her images are highly focused on the body, its predicelctions, sexuality and violence. The poem below speaks to these impulses and steps inside the mind of a child who knows what it is to hate, and to lash out. Where do these felings come from? Olds is nototriously silent about her personal biography. But a brief bio, and links to an interview and articles can be found on this web page.

“Warrior: 5th Grade,” by Sharon Olds

I don’t remember who had set it up,
but I knew, all day, that when night came,
at the sleepover, at Dinny Craviotto’s,
I would challenge Shelly Ashby to a fight
for picking on Betty Jean Hadden. I knew
public opinion was behind me, my mouth and
fists and lungs were swollen, slightly,
with nobleness. All day I was modest,
eyes cast down in righteousness, I was
the scourge of the John Muir Brownie Troop, I was a
moral instrument. I was very happy,
that night I would get to hit someone.
I had had a couple of fights, before,
and I loved the slight give of the body, the
contraption of the fist, like a small dollhouse
filled with erasers and rocks, and the free
swing through the air, that sideways plummet,
and the hit, the crunching noise, the rubbery
curve of the ribs, their spring, I wanted
to hurt someone, someone bad,
and be hurt, I wanted to be hit when I
could hit back. I wasn’t thinking of
my mother’s blows, which anyway weren’t
flesh on flesh, she kept the token
tortoise carapace between us, but she
swung with passion, I wanted to be
like her, and hit, and hit, and hit.
I had my style decided on –
left arm whirling, David’s sling,
my fist its stone, right arm jabbing
out and back, fast, I was a
threshing-machine of punishment, I would
move across the Craviotto living-room un-
beatable, I would harvest Shelly Ashby,
bitter Brownie with the pouting bee-bit lips.
And I don’t remember what came next, I remember
a circle of faces, an outer circle
of trussed-up sleeping-bags, lumps,
camels kneeling in the desert, I remember
nothing about it for years, until
it came to me that I thought that my lover was too
gentle – I was twenty – I realized that I wanted to be
fucked blind, pummelled half dead with it.

Study Questions

1. What does this poem tell you about the nature of violence and the damaging effects of child abuse?

2. As a child, the speaker believes that she is being noble to challenge a classmate and refers to herself as a “moral instrument.” How did this misconception come about?

3. How have the author’s relationships as a child influenced her romantic relationships as an adult?