The Spirit Child - Reed Venrick
poem read by Timothy Arliss OBrien
The Spirit Child
“L’enfant Spirituel”
Reed Venrick
The Spirit Child
“L’enfant Spirituel”
She loved horses, she spoke
Softly to them, just as she did
With friends and children.
Officers’ horses would strain
On tethered ropes to stand
Closer, nudging—stomping
Hooves, now and then, to ward
Off flies or mosquitoes—but some
Soldiers complained. Jeanne
Knew more names of horses
Than she did men. She, born
In the land of war and religion,
Frightened by fire, not because
Of heat, she said, but smoky
Campfires caused her sinuses
To stop up, and then, the tone
Of her voice would drop into
A hoarse whisper. Jeanne didn’t
Remember, but her mother said
A burning candle had fallen
On her when she was three
Or four. The hot wax had left
A permanent stomach scar;
Perhaps that was when her
Fear of fire began. Once,
Jeanne overheard her mother
Speaking covertly to her older
Sister, Jeanne’s favorite aunt.
“When I saw the mark the hot wax made—
“Where did it burn?”
On her umbilical cord.”
“So what’s the—“
“Then I knew.”
“Knew what?”
“I shouldn’t say.
“Then why speak of it?”
“You think I like to speak of fire that might one day…”
“Oh rubbish, how could you think that?
“Because I saw it in a dream.
“A dream?”
“A nightmare.”
Jeanne of Arc came from the northeast
Of West Francia, near the Meuse
River. The mother had five children,
Jeanne was the fourth of five,
The others were brunette or
Blond, but Jeanne had dark
Hair she bobbed at puberty.
Her peasant father, when drunk,
Ranted that Jeanne was not
His blood, but her mother cried
And vehemently denied. And
He could be violent—he’d struck
The neighbor, who suggested
Jeanne was a witch—hadn’t they
Heard the stories about voices
She’d heard from God? As Jeanne’s
Mother watched her grow, she
Would gaze at the child that
Soon called her “spirit child.”
Sometimes the mother would
Smile with delight, as a parent
Will, but sometimes she went
To weep in the kitchen, and
When her older sister came in
To ask what was wrong, Jeanne’s
Mother would shake her head,
And when the siblings asked why
She referred to Jeanne as “her
Spirit child,” she would only say
It was the same night Jeanne
Was born that it was revealed, but
The older sister rebuked the mother—
“You shouldn’t call her that.”
“What?”
“A spirit child.”
“And why not if—
“Because sometimes words make things
come true.”
Reed Venrick resides and travels in France part of each year, fascinated with French
history, literature, painting, architecture, and can't stop trying to learn more on the mystery and pronunciation
of the French language.
