Chapter summaries Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head Warsan Shire

Chapter 27: Backwards – Analysis and Summary

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary

The poem “Backwards” imagines a world where time runs in reverse as a way to undo past traumas. The speaker describes a father walking backward into a room and then sitting down permanently, symbolising an attempt to restore his presence. Blood runs back into the nose, bodies shrink, teeth re-enter gums—a literal reversal of harm. The speaker declares she can make her family loved again “just say the word.” She threatens to give abusers stumps for hands if they ever touched without consent. The poem then reverses specific traumatic events: step‑dad spits liquor back into the glass, mother’s body rolls back up the stairs, a bone pops back into place, and perhaps a miscarriage is undone (“maybe she keeps the baby”). The speaker addresses a younger “kid,” offering reassurance: “Maybe we’re okay, kid?” The entire life will be rewritten, flooded with so much love that nothing else can be seen. The poem’s structure mirrors its content: the second half repeats the first half in reverse order, enacting the backward motion it describes.

Key Events

  • Father’s reversal – The father walks backward into a room and sits down for the rest of his life, a way to “bring Dad back.”
  • Physical reversals – Blood returns to the nose; bodies shrink; breasts disappear; cheeks soften; teeth sink back into gums.
  • Conditional protection – The speaker says she can make the family loved, and can give abusers stumps for hands if they ever touched without consent.
  • Mother’s trauma undone – The mother’s body rolls back up the stairs, a bone pops into place, and a baby is kept instead of lost.
  • Rewriting life – The speaker vows to rewrite the entire life, filling it with overwhelming love.
  • Structural mirroring – The second half of the poem is the first half reversed line‑for‑line, embodying the poem’s theme.

Character Development

  • The speaker – Emerges as a protective, god‑like figure who can reverse time and rewrite reality. She addresses a younger self or sibling (“kid”), showing a maternal or older‑sibling voice. Her willingness to punish abusers reveals a fierce guardian.
  • Dad – Briefly present as a figure who can be brought back through reversal, but his role is passive (walking into a room, sitting for life).
  • Mother – Her trauma is visualised as a physical fall that is reversed; she becomes a symbol of surviving violence.
  • Step‑dad – Shown only as an abuser whose action (spitting liquor) is undone. The poem offers no redemption, only erasure.
  • Kid – The addressee, a younger version of the speaker or a sibling. The poem’s repeated “Maybe we’re okay, kid?” suggests shared suffering and the need for reassurance.

Themes, Symbols and Motifs

  • Reversal as healing – The entire poem is a fantasy of undoing harm by moving backward through time. Reversal becomes a metaphor for wish‑fulfilment and processing trauma.
  • The poem as a tool – The speaker explicitly says “I can write the poem and make it disappear.” Literature itself becomes an instrument to erase painful memories or events.
  • Bodily disintegration and reassembly – Shrinking bodies, retracting teeth, and popping bones symbolise the physical toll of abuse and the hope of returning to a pre‑trauma state.
  • Abundant love – The repeated line “there’ll be so much love you won’t be able to see beyond it” contrasts with the poem’s dark subject matter, suggesting that love can overwhelm and, perhaps, obscure suffering.
  • Structuring as content – The palindrome‑like structure reinforces the theme: the poem literally turns back on itself, mirroring the backward motion it narrates.

Why This Chapter Matters

“Backwards” serves as a pivotal emotional and structural poem in Shire’s collection. It directly addresses family trauma—specifically abuse from a step‑father and the loss of a sibling—while experimenting with form to enact the theme of reversal. The poem gives voice to a survivor’s desire to rewrite history and protect loved ones retroactively. Its placement near the end of the book (Chapter 27) offers a hopeful, if fragile, vision of reclamation. The poem also showcases Shire’s signature technique of using repetition and circular structure to mirror psychological states.

Study Questions and Answers

1. How does the poem’s structure support its theme?

The poem is arranged as a palindrome: the second half repeats the first half in reverse line order. This structural choice physically demonstrates the act of going backward, making the readers experience the reversal as they progress through the lines. It reinforces the speaker’s wish to undo events by literally moving through the text in reverse.

2. What does the speaker mean by “I can write the poem and make it disappear”?

The speaker claims agency over memory and trauma through the act of writing. By composing a poem, she can not only imagine a different outcome but also symbolically make the original painful events vanish. This reflects the therapeutic power of poetry to reshape narratives and even erase harm within the safe space of art.

3. Who is the “kid” addressed in the poem, and why is the line “Maybe we’re okay” repeated?

The “kid” is likely a younger version of the speaker or a sibling who experienced the same trauma. The repetition of “Maybe we’re okay” reveals uncertainty—it is a hopeful, fragile assertion rather than a confident fact. The speaker tries to comfort both herself and the child, acknowledging that healing is uncertain.