Chapter 33: Bless the Sharmuto – Summary and Analysis
⚠️ 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 speaker observes her sister washing herself at 4 a.m., soaping between her legs, her hair curled like a prayer. The sister winks at the speaker while bent over the sink, her small breasts bruised from sucking, and offers a gap-toothed smile before popping her gum and warning: “don’t forget, boys are haram.” On some nights, the family hears the sister screaming in her room. The adults respond by playing Surah Al Baqarah (a long chapter of the Quran) to drown out her voice. The mother has banned the sister from saying God’s name, because the mother believes anything that leaves the sister’s mouth sounds sexual. The poem thus juxtaposes the sister’s intimate, reclaimed sexuality with her family’s religiously justified attempts to erase her voice and presence.
Key Events
- The sister is seen washing herself at 4 a.m., an act that combines private hygiene with a kind of ritual.
- She winks at the speaker and warns that boys are haram (forbidden in Islam).
- On other nights, the sister’s screams are heard from her room.
- The adults play Surah Al Baqarah to cover the sound of her screaming.
- The mother forbids the sister from uttering God’s name, claiming that everything the sister says has a sexual quality.
Character Development
The Sister: Already marked by sexual experience (breasts bruised from sucking), she nevertheless maintains a playful, defiant attitude – winking, popping gum, issuing a religious warning with irony. Her screams indicate trauma or distress, but the poem does not specify the source. Her body and voice are sites of both shame and reclamation. She is not named; the title “Sharmuto” (a Somali slur for prostitute or slut) is reappropriated by the speaker as a blessing.
The Mother: Acts as the enforcer of religious and social norms. By banning the sister from saying God’s name, she equates the sister’s voice with impurity. Her actions reveal a hypocrisy: using the Quran to drown out the sister instead of offering comfort.
The Adults (general): They collectively participate in silencing the sister, treating her screams as something to be covered rather than addressed. Their choice of Surah Al Baqarah, a chapter traditionally used for protection, suggests they see the sister as a spiritual threat.
Themes, Symbols, or Motifs
Reclaimed Slur (Sharmuto): The title blesses a word that is normally used to shame women. The poem itself becomes a counter-narrative, refusing to let the sister be defined only by others’ judgment.
Religion as Silencing Tool: The Quranic recitation and the ban on saying God’s name show faith being weaponized to suppress a woman’s voice and sexuality rather than to offer mercy or guidance.
Body and Voice as Contested Territory: The sister’s body (soaped, bruised, washed at dawn) and her voice (screams, warnings, any utterance) are both policed by the family. The poem suggests that the sister cannot speak without being sexualized, and therefore cannot speak at all within the family’s framework.
The Hour of 4 a.m.: Traditionally a time for prayer or private devotion, here it becomes the hour for washing away evidence of sexual activity. The sister’s hair is described as “a prayer of curls,” blurring the line between the sacred and the profane.
Why This Chapter Matters
“Bless the Sharmuto” is a concentrated example of the collection’s central tensions: the clash between inherited religious morality and the lived reality of a woman’s body, the use of faith as a weapon of control, and the possibility of blessing what has been cursed. The poem stands out for its economy – in just a few lines it establishes a character, a family dynamic, and a systemic hypocrisy. It also resonates with broader themes in the book about diaspora, shame, and the struggle to claim one’s own story. Within the sequence, this chapter gives voice to a sister figure often silenced in the background of immigrant households.
Study Questions and Answers
1. What does the sister’s warning “boys are haram” reveal about her perspective?
The sister likely speaks from experience. By winking and delivering the warning in a playful tone, she both acknowledges the religious rule and treats it as ironic, given her own activities. The warning may be a way of protecting her younger sibling while also asserting her own transgressive knowledge.
2. Why does the mother ban the sister from saying God’s name?
The mother believes that the sister’s voice is so steeped in sexuality that any utterance, including God’s name, would be profaned. This ban is a form of spiritual exile: the sister is cut off from the most basic act of religious identity. It reveals how the family conflates the sister’s sexuality with irredeemable impurity.
3. How does the use of Surah Al Baqarah function in the poem?
Surah Al Baqarah, the longest chapter of the Quran, is often recited for protection or to drive away evil. The adults play it to drown out the sister’s screams, implying they view her screams as a kind of evil or disruption. The irony is that the sacred text is used to silence a family member in distress rather than to comfort her, highlighting religious hypocrisy.