Painting: Nigel Cooke; Photography: Ellen Rogers
This is an essay I recently wrote for my English class. The literary influences are quite obvious, and I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
The piece is subject to interpretation.
Ophelia walked through the forest, whispering words she had learnt in the dark hollows of the dimly lit world outside the forest. She repeatedly whispered the words of Rimbaud unknowingly, breathing verses of his poetry, not knowing why and not understanding why she did so. Her silken fawn dress rustled in the deep, quiet forest. She resembled an innocent dove, willowing, with wide eyes and flowing auburn hair. Her locks were now matted with dirt. She had been roaming the forest for a while now. She had not eaten or slept well in days, her dress was stained with the juice of ripe berries, her pale, white legs covered with bruises and wounds.
The silence of the forest slowly drove her mad. She could not comprehend her surroundings. The trees seemed to turn into men, at night they seemed to be watching her. At times she would wake up at the break of dawn, not knowing what had happened the night before. Her mind had become a confusing, tempestuous and dark place. She dared not think.
Ophelia was a forest fire. She was beautiful like a forest fire, something to be admired from a distance, not up close.
She walks through the forest dreaming of a summer she never knew. Of the citrusy smells of oranges from Seville, that she had only read of in tattered books that lay in the hollows of the attic of a place where she had once thought she belonged. She roams the forest day and night, searching for a piece of her soul she lost. Searching for it, searching for memories, hoping that she can find them, if only a tiny, tattered pieces of it.
The domineering trees envelop and scare her.
“The forest has eyes”, she whispers frantically, darting her eyes from tree to tree. The trees look at her like a lustful and hungry predator, ready to devour it’s prey.
The sun has fallen, and the sun has risen. Days have gone, and nights have gone. Yet she still roams the forest, her hair bedraggled, her face a mess. She wishes to think of a happier place, yet her mind will not relent. It seems relentless in it’s quest to consume her.
She walks and she walks, the chilly air rushing through her legs, leaving a sea of goose bumps on her skin. The wind whistles across the forest, rejuvenating dead leaves and making them dance to the rhythm of it’s tune. She looks up and laughs a madman’s laugh, twisting and turning to the rhythm of the wind and leaves.
It is cold now. The rabbits are huddled together in their warm little burrows with their beloved, keeping each other warm, huddling together. Ophelia is envious of the love she sees and keeps walking onwards through the endless forest, not knowing where she is going.
At last she reaches the river. Symbol of all things immortal, holy, ever-changing, irrepressible and free. Her toes touch the water, making the trail of her silken dress wet. She bends down to sip the cold water of the river, only to look up and see that the river has turned into a ferocious beast! An odious monster!
Blood explodes from it’s fang-like teeth, and the beast ferociously faces Ophelia, rearing her charge like an angry bull, waiting to ravish her fangs on her prey. Ophelia’s eyes widene with fear and she started running away.
She followed her closely, the blood from her teeth, falling like rain on Ophelia’s shoulders, destroying her already stained silk dress.
Ophelia trips and falls, her gashes crying for help. A menacing cold engulfs her.
With a twinkle of the beast’s ivory fangs, Ophelia disappears under the river, never to be found again.
