Summary
The poem begins with an epigraph in the form of two quotations, framing and leading into the poem itself. The first quotation comes from a well-known Elvis Presley song, and asks the listener whether they are lonesome and whether they miss the speaker (in this case, the song's speaker). The second quotation, claiming that Elvis Presley "is alive and she's female," comes from pop star Madonna.
In stanza one, the poem's speaker explains that she lives in a convent, where she takes care of a garden and watches the plants grow. There, she leads a life of work and prayer, praying in particular for "the immortal soul of rock 'n' roll." She is known as Sister Presley. Like her brother, she is a good dancer, pleasing the Mother Superior of the convent with the way she can move her hips. Standing among the herbs, she hears distantly the Christian music known as Gregorian chanting. The Latin chant transcribed on the page translates to "Our lamb is sacrificed." The speaker then begins to describe her uniform, beginning with the dark, modest habit nuns wear.
Analysis
The poem's two epigraphs help place the reader in the world of the poem, ensuring that its imaginative subject matter—a fictional twin sister for one of the most famous musicians in history, a juxtaposition of pop culture and religion—is not too jarring or distracting. The first of the quotations borrows from the voice and artistry of Elvis himself, helping to bridge the gap between the real figure and the fictional sister Duffy has conjured in this poem. Through the use of this lyric, Duffy helps make her speaker feel more firmly grounded in reality. At the same time, this first quotation introduces the theme of loneliness. In the context of the poem to come, this line from Elvis's music seems to speak directly to the separation of the two siblings. The second quotation is a disarmingly direct statement of the poem's narrative, which is to say, the possibility of a female version of Elvis Presley. However, the fact that the quote is pulled from Madonna offers an additional touch. "Madonna" is a name often used to refer to the Virgin Mary. Mentioning the musician Madonna, therefore, foreshadows the poem's blending of religion and pop culture.
The most immediately striking thing about this poem may be its unusual blend of diction, or word choice. The poem begins with the line "In the convent, y'all," mixing the Southern, lightly folksy dialect of the word "y'all" with the elevated religious associations conjured by the word "convent." This is only the first instance of such a combination. Throughout the work, Duffy mixes a down-home, slangy, or Southern diction with the lexicon of the church. A similar juxtaposition can be seen further down in the same stanza, with the phrase "immortal soul/of rock 'n' roll," or else in the next stanza with the phrase "the Reverend Mother/digs." In these cases, Duffy also makes use of enjambment, a poetic technique in which a line is broken in the middle of a phrase. Enjambment here creates a fractured, barbed rhythm, giving a sense that the speaker possesses a tinge of her brother's rebellious musical sensibility. At the same time, enjambment creates an element of surprise. The religious term "The Reverend Mother" is separated from the word "digs" by a line break, allowing a beat before the punchline-like entrance of the unexpected slang word.
This half of the poem does a great deal to establish the unexpected similarities between Elvis and his cloistered sister. The realms of religion and rock stardom are juxtaposed for humorous effect, but they are also paralleled. For instance, the speaker quotes a hymn referring to the sacrifice of Jesus (often symbolized as a lamb in the Christian tradition). This suggests subtly that Elvis himself can be understood as a type of Christ figure. Presley led an infamously difficult life, marred by addiction and an early death despite his enormous success. Duffy hints that, in a sense, Elvis gave up his own life in the service of creating music for others. While the poem suggests that musical stardom can be Christlike, it also implies that religious life can be artistic. The speaker tends a garden, a pursuit that is literally creative in the sense that it creates new life. More explicitly, her life in the convent is full of music, though it is religious music rather than rock music.
