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The Brief Reincarnation of a Girl
In 2006, a four-year-old Massachusetts girl died from prolonged exposure to a cocktail of drugs that a psychiatrist had prescribed to treat ADHD and bipolar disorder; her parents were convicted of her murder. In The Brief Reincarnation of a Girl, Sue Goyette strives to confront the senselessness of this story, answering logic’s failure to encompass the complexity of mental illness, poverty and child neglect (or that of our torn and tangled social ‘safety net’) with a mythopoetic, sideways use of image and language. Avoiding easy indignation, Goyette portrays the court proceedings’ usual suspects in unusual ways (the judge, the jury, the lawyers, the witnesses and the girl’s troubled parents), evokes the ghost of the girl, personifies poverty as a belligerent bully and offers an unexpected emblem of love and hope in a bear. Like the utterances of a Shakespearean fool, Goyette’s quirky, often counter-logical poems offer a more potent vision of reality than any documentary account, her eulogy for a girl society let down renewing the prospect for empathy and change.
64 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2015
About the author
Sue Goyette
19 books40 followersSue Goyette is a Canadian poet and novelist. Born in Sherbrooke, Quebec, Goyette grew up in Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville, on Montreal's south shore.
Her first poetry book The True Names of Birds (1998) was nominated for the 1999 Governor General's Award, the Pat Lowther Award and the Gerald Lampert Award. Goyette's first novel, Lures: A Novel (2002), was nominated for the 2003 Thomas Head Raddall Award. She has also written another poetry collection, Undone (2004), and won the 2008 CBC Literary Award in poetry for the poem "Outskirts". The poetry collection of the same name, Outskirts won the Atlantic Poetry Prize in 2012. Goyette's fourth poetry collection, Ocean, was published in 2013 by Gaspereau Press.
Goyette has been a member of the faculty of The Maritime Writers' Workshop, The Banff Wired Studio, and The Sage Hill Writing Experience.
She presently lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and teaches at Dalhousie University.
Her first poetry book The True Names of Birds (1998) was nominated for the 1999 Governor General's Award, the Pat Lowther Award and the Gerald Lampert Award. Goyette's first novel, Lures: A Novel (2002), was nominated for the 2003 Thomas Head Raddall Award. She has also written another poetry collection, Undone (2004), and won the 2008 CBC Literary Award in poetry for the poem "Outskirts". The poetry collection of the same name, Outskirts won the Atlantic Poetry Prize in 2012. Goyette's fourth poetry collection, Ocean, was published in 2013 by Gaspereau Press.
Goyette has been a member of the faculty of The Maritime Writers' Workshop, The Banff Wired Studio, and The Sage Hill Writing Experience.
She presently lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and teaches at Dalhousie University.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
March 25, 2017
I think I have a crush on Sue Goyette, guys.
I loved this book. I was in tears for most of it. And hearing her speak about it in my class was amazing. God I loved it.
Read for ENGL 4471: Contemporary Canadian Poetry
I loved this book. I was in tears for most of it. And hearing her speak about it in my class was amazing. God I loved it.
Read for ENGL 4471: Contemporary Canadian Poetry
May 16, 2015
I loved this poem. It was strange, twisted, beautiful, and extremely evocative. I don't read a whole lot of poetry, so I'm sure I missed a lot of the finer details and nuanced metaphors, but my god is this a wonderful way to retell and examine a painful news story.
The language! The turns of phrase! The imagery!! Goyette is so talented at explaining complicated thoughts through (weird and fantastical) poetic language: “The judge wanted to know if the daycare teacher could remember anything about the girl's mother and the teacher changed her voice into preschool scissors and carefully cut around the words she was preparing to say. When she pulled her words out, they remained joined as well as individual silhouettes representing "tired" and "not quite understanding the care the rough gem of childhood required." What she said also resembled a janitor's bucket and mop and everyone on the jury admired how she sloshed gamely into her testimony, how, at first, it seemed she was just spreading the same dirty water around, but when she was done the floor indeed looked cleaner to them."
Definitely a departure from the kinds of books I normally read, but so worth it!
The language! The turns of phrase! The imagery!! Goyette is so talented at explaining complicated thoughts through (weird and fantastical) poetic language: “The judge wanted to know if the daycare teacher could remember anything about the girl's mother and the teacher changed her voice into preschool scissors and carefully cut around the words she was preparing to say. When she pulled her words out, they remained joined as well as individual silhouettes representing "tired" and "not quite understanding the care the rough gem of childhood required." What she said also resembled a janitor's bucket and mop and everyone on the jury admired how she sloshed gamely into her testimony, how, at first, it seemed she was just spreading the same dirty water around, but when she was done the floor indeed looked cleaner to them."
Definitely a departure from the kinds of books I normally read, but so worth it!
May 14, 2026
every time i pick up a poem i’m looking to find a combination of words that startles me. this one gave me that feeling on every single page
January 19, 2016
It takes away from the emotions trying to be conveyed in the book when the author has their head up their ass with how pretentious this was
January 29, 2022
The girl refused to be afraid when she climbed
on high things. Her mother shaved the legs of the furniture
and, along with some cough syrup, stewed it
with a few of the girl's father's beer caps. The girl spit
a whole parade's worth of bicycle bells back at her
and pranced around in her diaper. The mother sat on the closet,
lit a candle, and located the doctor with binoculars.
The doctor, appearing as a bathrobe, urged
the mother to slap the girl with her slippers then take her
pulse. The girl had begun to growl which was upsetting
the cats. The mother upped the dosage of bottle caps
and added some baby Aspirin. The doctor suggested
more conventional medication, the girl sounded bipolar
and should be on a leash. What they didn't know
was that the girl had collected enough stickers
to reward the universe. She had a blanket and a bear.
She had resolved that when she got up from the floor
that last time, she'd be in another time zone
with better tasting furniture and a door that closed.
* * *
The girl's ghost was not necessarily a ghost
but more a representative of the girl's curiosity.
She moved with an ease that belied her death
and sat between her parents. The fire on her father's
crotch immediately went out and her mother's hold
on her water glass lightened. The girl wanted her bear.
She wanted to hold the bear to her heart and hear
for herself. Why would she believe anything
they told her? She could trust the bear. The times it insisted
she was in a forest and would soon come to its edge.
She didn't understand why her mouth was filled
with sand and kept emptying it like a shoe.
She couldn't taste the window she put her tongue to
so tried licking it like a popsicle. It wasn't that she missed
her mother and father, she just liked the cooking smell
of their clothes and thought she was hungry. Her daycare
teacher kept trying to hand her flowers but when she
reached out to take them, her teacher busied herself
with the Kleenex they'd turn into and wouldn't look up.
* * *
The doctor examined her childhood in the mirror.
Her siblings were vacationing in her eyes and so she was
seeing them everywhere. She quickly uncapped a vial
and swallowed a moment when she had guessed
the word her father had been looking for. She swallowed
the spoon she had used to feed her mother after
the surgery then straightened her blazer and added a couple
of inches to her height. The ghost of the girl had been
taunting her all morning. Slithering under chairs
and then pointing her wand and casting a spell
so she'd turn into a peach. A peach. The doctor scoffed
at the idea of turning into a peach. It showed how little
any of these people really knew her. She'd never allow
herself to become a peach. She left the bathroom
to poverty greedily smucking up even the thought
of the fruit.
* * *
Poverty didn't know the first things about eating
a unicorn. It gnawed at its horn but the glitter
settled in poverty's cavities which caused pain
to spark in its ears. It picked up a leg
but the delicious smell of green dazed it and poverty
found itself sitting down, scraping green out of the unicorn's
hoof. The ghost of the girl showed it how to start
a plant by placing the green at the bottom of a glass of water.
The plant quickly took root and offered its leaves
which poverty ate immediately. It was surprised how nourished
poverty felt after eating those leaves. The ghost of the girl
put her hand on the unicorn and the unicorn told her
that unicorns had never been captured in pill form.
What the girl had been prescribed was actually an elk
and even then not a real elk but a synthetic version
that probably made her feel worse. Poverty didn't have a belt
to undo, it was feeling that plenished.
* * *
The jury was told that the girl had been found
on the floor beside her parents' bed. Her arms
were described as sparrows that had once been inquisitive.
They were reminded how sparrows ignore any thought
of danger to investigate things they find alluring.
Members of the jury knew this of sparrows.
Many of them had bird feeders in their yard
or suction cupped to the windows of their apartments.
They were told that the girl's head was bigger
than her body because she'd still been a fledgling.
Poverty was having a field day with all the walk
of fledglings. Little jelly beans; unexpected disasters.
The way a fledgling would lose its balance and fall over.
Perfect, poverty said, popping another one in its mouth
and crunching.
on high things. Her mother shaved the legs of the furniture
and, along with some cough syrup, stewed it
with a few of the girl's father's beer caps. The girl spit
a whole parade's worth of bicycle bells back at her
and pranced around in her diaper. The mother sat on the closet,
lit a candle, and located the doctor with binoculars.
The doctor, appearing as a bathrobe, urged
the mother to slap the girl with her slippers then take her
pulse. The girl had begun to growl which was upsetting
the cats. The mother upped the dosage of bottle caps
and added some baby Aspirin. The doctor suggested
more conventional medication, the girl sounded bipolar
and should be on a leash. What they didn't know
was that the girl had collected enough stickers
to reward the universe. She had a blanket and a bear.
She had resolved that when she got up from the floor
that last time, she'd be in another time zone
with better tasting furniture and a door that closed.
- pg. 1
* * *
The girl's ghost was not necessarily a ghost
but more a representative of the girl's curiosity.
She moved with an ease that belied her death
and sat between her parents. The fire on her father's
crotch immediately went out and her mother's hold
on her water glass lightened. The girl wanted her bear.
She wanted to hold the bear to her heart and hear
for herself. Why would she believe anything
they told her? She could trust the bear. The times it insisted
she was in a forest and would soon come to its edge.
She didn't understand why her mouth was filled
with sand and kept emptying it like a shoe.
She couldn't taste the window she put her tongue to
so tried licking it like a popsicle. It wasn't that she missed
her mother and father, she just liked the cooking smell
of their clothes and thought she was hungry. Her daycare
teacher kept trying to hand her flowers but when she
reached out to take them, her teacher busied herself
with the Kleenex they'd turn into and wouldn't look up.
- pg. 15
* * *
The doctor examined her childhood in the mirror.
Her siblings were vacationing in her eyes and so she was
seeing them everywhere. She quickly uncapped a vial
and swallowed a moment when she had guessed
the word her father had been looking for. She swallowed
the spoon she had used to feed her mother after
the surgery then straightened her blazer and added a couple
of inches to her height. The ghost of the girl had been
taunting her all morning. Slithering under chairs
and then pointing her wand and casting a spell
so she'd turn into a peach. A peach. The doctor scoffed
at the idea of turning into a peach. It showed how little
any of these people really knew her. She'd never allow
herself to become a peach. She left the bathroom
to poverty greedily smucking up even the thought
of the fruit.
- pg. 28
* * *
Poverty didn't know the first things about eating
a unicorn. It gnawed at its horn but the glitter
settled in poverty's cavities which caused pain
to spark in its ears. It picked up a leg
but the delicious smell of green dazed it and poverty
found itself sitting down, scraping green out of the unicorn's
hoof. The ghost of the girl showed it how to start
a plant by placing the green at the bottom of a glass of water.
The plant quickly took root and offered its leaves
which poverty ate immediately. It was surprised how nourished
poverty felt after eating those leaves. The ghost of the girl
put her hand on the unicorn and the unicorn told her
that unicorns had never been captured in pill form.
What the girl had been prescribed was actually an elk
and even then not a real elk but a synthetic version
that probably made her feel worse. Poverty didn't have a belt
to undo, it was feeling that plenished.
- pg. 36
* * *
The jury was told that the girl had been found
on the floor beside her parents' bed. Her arms
were described as sparrows that had once been inquisitive.
They were reminded how sparrows ignore any thought
of danger to investigate things they find alluring.
Members of the jury knew this of sparrows.
Many of them had bird feeders in their yard
or suction cupped to the windows of their apartments.
They were told that the girl's head was bigger
than her body because she'd still been a fledgling.
Poverty was having a field day with all the walk
of fledglings. Little jelly beans; unexpected disasters.
The way a fledgling would lose its balance and fall over.
Perfect, poverty said, popping another one in its mouth
and crunching.
- pg. 54
August 29, 2026
At one point, the doctor, during a break in the trial, is annoyed at the presence of the ghost of the girl casting spells to turn her into a peach. She scoffs at the idea that she would "become" a peach, and how this shows how little people understand of her.
In other words, Goyette uses sharp satire to deconstruct authorities and institutions in a manner that is specific, argumentative, and risky, but never sloppy or careless. Her sharp wit and sarcasm are amusing, but never truly funny; it's chilling and painful particularly because it makes a mockery of people who failed a helpless child spectacularly. Any moment stripped of context might seem juvenile or low-brow, but when attached to these figures it becomes very cathartic to nod along and say, "Yeah. Screw these imbeciles."
In other words, Goyette uses sharp satire to deconstruct authorities and institutions in a manner that is specific, argumentative, and risky, but never sloppy or careless. Her sharp wit and sarcasm are amusing, but never truly funny; it's chilling and painful particularly because it makes a mockery of people who failed a helpless child spectacularly. Any moment stripped of context might seem juvenile or low-brow, but when attached to these figures it becomes very cathartic to nod along and say, "Yeah. Screw these imbeciles."
September 29, 2024
poetic “narrative” of a horrid real-life murder case (overdosing a 4-year-old with medication prescribed for her ADHD and bipolar syndrome). a super evocative way of conveying all kinds of sideways nuance, moving/upsetting in the way of Carmen Machado’s In The Dream House.
https://www.patriotledger.com/story/n...
https://www.patriotledger.com/story/n...
December 13, 2016
Beauty and horror all mixed in one. Sue takes a most difficult subject and transforms it with poetry so we can bear to read it. I believe Sue Goyette is the master of metaphor.
April 29, 2018
Unrelenting in the devastation and sorrow of lives splintered by neglect, abuse, and childhood.
August 13, 2019
Fave!
February 24, 2016
Sue Goyette’s The Brief Reincarnation of a Girl has left me breathless and heartbroken by a tragic story uniquely depicted. Goyette’s series of linked poems has also left me awestruck once again at her singular gifts for evoking emotion and revelations through startling juxtapositions of animate and inanimate, real and imagined, quick and dead, soulless and spiritual.
Read my complete review here: http://bookgagabooks.ca/2016/03/11/th...
Read my complete review here: http://bookgagabooks.ca/2016/03/11/th...
May 14, 2021
3.5
Overall I really liked this. This is the first time I’ve read an event or narrative told completely in verse and I think it was mostly successful. I was tracking a lot of the metaphors, however at times I found it got so nonsensical that I wasn’t totally sure what Goyette was trying to say. I did enjoy dark and whimsical tone of this, it reminded me of a Grimms fairy tale.
Overall I really liked this. This is the first time I’ve read an event or narrative told completely in verse and I think it was mostly successful. I was tracking a lot of the metaphors, however at times I found it got so nonsensical that I wasn’t totally sure what Goyette was trying to say. I did enjoy dark and whimsical tone of this, it reminded me of a Grimms fairy tale.
September 9, 2015
I dont read a ton of poems let alone long ones..this book is extraordinary!
December 27, 2016
Haunting and profound Goyette has a mastery of narrative that transforms us. I was both moved and inspired by this poignant story.
April 16, 2017
Unsure what the eff I just read, but I finished it so it couldn't have been too bad?
February 16, 2018
Really weird and kind of excellent.
I finished in in a couple hours.
I finished in in a couple hours.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews