April Ridge

The Bride—Opening Statement

The Bride of Frankenstein, like many women in Hollywood at the time, was created, entertained, and sustained for a short period of time solely for men's pleasure and purpose.

She was created, horrified by her monster kin (a proposed mate, who just wanted a friend), and destroyed all in one day.

A brief time later in Son of Frankenstein, when the monster is shown to have survived the explosion he created at the end of Bride of Frankenstein, no survival of The Bride is mentioned. 

He states, “You stay, we belong dead” to Dr. Pretorius—without asking The Bride's consent, of course. 

Perhaps she momentarily survived the blast, later dying of heartbreak for the short and disappointing life she was granted by two madmen piecing her together in a dirty, secret laboratory? 

Who is to say Bride belongs dead? 

If they had revived her story, instead of the first monster created by a lunatic doctor's obsessive narcissistic God complex, perhaps we would have seen a different outcome, a freedom and earlier realization of feminist rights for Hollywood horror monsters, and beyond. 

Less overall deaths in the village of Frankenstein.

A kinder attitude toward botched necromantic experiments.

The Bride happily wed to a gentler, sensitive man who doesn't go to pieces every time a blind friar lights a small fire. 

Perhaps not all of these scenes would have become reality. 

But The Bride was certainly never given much consideration or a chance to elaborate on her full potential before being blown to smithereens by some bumbling piecemeal groom hastily deciding her fate and sealing her doom.

This character is one of the most well-known images of classic and modern horror film, yet has been forgotten in the wings, an afterthought of the 1930s. Remembered when ladies want to have a costume a little spookier, with a cool hairdo and some bitchin’ scars.

These poems are a tribute to The Bride.

The Midnight Peace

He grasps at her, 
never knowing 
human touch in a delicate way.

To squeeze, 
But not enough 
to leave her 
unable to breathe.

To compare their skins' battles
in the clear moonlight 
of a thousand glorious nights.

They share an unnatural love 
for the dark, 
unable to fully hide 
the horror 
the shame of being 
a freak show representation 
of humanity, 
a mishmash of parts 
sewn together with 
the crazed lunacy
of a failed physician— 
their creator insane with jealousy 
at their instant connection. 

The creature 
has stolen his wife 
right out from underneath him. 

The creature suddenly a sweet talker, 
a dancer and crooner of the night.

Should have stayed
out of those Los Angeles cemeteries.

Shouldn't have ravaged
the resting place of John Holmes. 

Should have avoided 
the graves of 
Dean Martin and Cary Grant.

Now that creep
can once again dance and
old double left-footed Doctor Frankenstein 
doesn't stand a chance.

It’s Fall

The trees: 
they’re blushing like a drunk 
on a sherry bender. 

The skunked bottle 
stolen from the kitchen 
in the middle of the night, 
their cheeks red as the days are long.

The leaves are 
that heavy wet shade of red 
I reserve for thinking of 
warm sweaters and used tampons.

The orange a rich shade of 
bubbly vomit 
from too many frozen mimosas 
on a cold, nostalgic morning alone.

The mottled brown age spots 
on the cracking leaves, 
the thirsty maples reach out 
with branches like hands 
that are diseased.

All of this 
against a background of 
different shades of green:
leaves either brave or 
too dumb or 
too stubborn to let go of 
their summer colors.

The soft yellow like 
a sign of high fever, 
when there's no sign of 
relief at all.

The sure sign that it's fall. 

April Ridge loves all things Halloween, poetry, and folk art. She lives happily hidden in the woods of Monroe County, Indiana with her man and two wild orange cats. She is the Chair of Writers Guild at Bloomington and has been published in SubTerreanean, Sardonic Spectator, Beatnik Cowboy, SOUP CAN Magazine, Alien Buddha Press, The Ryder Magazine, Between These Shores Literary & Arts Annual, and What is and What Will be by Indiana Writers Center.