CW: Child abuse, Canadian Residential Schools, Racism

Some truths are too brutal for prose and require a different language. One of metaphor and nightmare, where a black lizard can crawl into a child’s mouth and lay eggs. Gregory Scofield’s “Cycle (of the black lizard)” is built from this unsettling vocabulary, offering a haunting testimony to the intergenerational trauma inflicted by Canada’s residential school system.

Charting the insidious journey of the eponymous creature, the poem is an embodiment of colonial violence feasting slowly from within. Young are hatched into a new generation. This is not the lizard of positive Indigenous folklore, but a devastating inversion — a symbol of how colonial machinery corrupts and poisons cultural identity.

For myself, reading “Cycle” was staring into the distorted mirror of my own childhood. A reflection of the silent, heavy-eyed burden carried by children in homes shadowed by pain. Scofield’s work is a crucial political act, but it is also a profound exploration of an Indigenous paradigm, where trauma is a cyclical force and resilience is the quiet, determined act of breaking that cycle.

From the outset, the poem immerses the reader in a disturbing narrative of abuse and trauma. A nameless boy suffers physical and psychological abuse at residential school, voice silenced by fear and shame. The metaphorical black lizard serves as the invasive, corrupting force of colonialism and the Church.

In “Cycle,” trauma is the insidious creature destroying from within, passed on from generation to generation. For most, lizards are repulsive and would embody the invasive nature of colonialism and abuse. The lizard is black — the dark opacity of colonial history and trauma unexplored and understated. Cycles. Cycles of abuse and far-reaching effects. Silence and suffering continue as the lizard lays eggs. Scofield forces readers to confront the horrific legacy of residential schools and the lasting impact of this systemic violence on Indigenous communities, as “Cycle” is a political statement and a critique of the residential school system. From the outset, the poem immerses the reader in a disturbing narrative of abuse and trauma:

“so shy he wouldn’t say shit / if his mouth was full of it” (Scofield 3–4).

The speaker points to the systemic silencing and victimisation of Indigenous children, laying bare the cruel irony of religious institutions perpetuating violence underneath the guise of civilising the savages. The recurring image of the black lizard serves as a powerful stand-in for the Machiavellian, destructive nature of colonialism:

“the kind who eat the insides / feasting slowly / until their young are hatched”

The lizard’s creeping invasion mirrors the slow, calculated process of colonial destruction. Eggs are the perpetuation of trauma across generations.

“[t]hey thought he was just naturally rough, / like all Indians” and the expectation of the girl’s “Indian story” highlight the harmful racist assumptions marginalising Indigenous communities.

The final lines, how the trauma “was in her pee-hole, his mouth / a lizard crawled around / leaving eggs / during the Lord’s prayer” are particularly poignant and fucked up. The lizard’s violation during Christian prayer a damning indictment of insincerity and the brutality inherent in colonial salvation efforts.

“Cycle” humanizes Indigenous suffering, disrupting the colonial hierarchy by giving voice to the silenced, and claiming the space to narrate Indigenous experiences on their own terms.

The Indigenous paradigm is at the heart of the poem — the idea of flux and the black lizard is in continuous motion: “[a]t first it just moved around / inside his head / maneuvering serpentine” and the concept of animism, “a lizard crawled inside his mouth / and laid eggs”. The lizard, a non-human entity, is attributed with agency and intention.

Funnily enough, many different Native American cultures view the lizard very positively:

“In Plains Indian tribes, lizards are associated with healing and survival, and also with masculinity. In some Plains tribes, a newborn boy’s umbilical cord was sewn into an amulet in the shape of a lizard to ensure his health and strength. Today, many Cheyenne people still consider it bad luck to kill a lizard. In the mythology of some California Indian tribes, such as the Pomo, Lizard was one of the major figures of creation, who made humans partially in his image. In Southwestern tribes, horned lizards (sometimes called “horny-toads” in English) are considered sacred medicine animals; Gila Monster (a type of large poisonous desert lizard) features as a powerful hero in Navajo”

The harrowing inversion of the lizard’s traditional meaning has Scofield provide stark insight into the devastation of Indigenous cultures and identities. The antithetical nature of the reptile underscores the traumatic transformation of Indigenous cultures under colonial influence.

The black lizard casts a long shadow over my own life, decades after the residential schools. Like the boy in Scofield’s poem, I too grew up in silence, swallowing words I dared not speak. My father, beaten down by life and often by the heavy fists of the police, taught me early on the dangers of talking too much, of drawing attention.

The ominous refrain of the poem, “At school, the teacher / noticed his kids had dull eyes / and never spoke or laughed” echoes my own experiences — the hardships at home made it difficult to smile or engage in the carefree laughter expected of childhood. My brother and I were children who carried burdens far too heavy, our eyes revealing the sombre realities. My father, much like the father figure in the poem, succumbed to alcoholism — the chosen anesthetic for the relentless pain of existence. “Each time her face got smashed / with his drunk fist” captures the cruel cycle of abuse and self-destruction that alcoholism often brings.

A cycle I watched unfold in my own home — a cycle that I, too, was at risk of entering. “Cycle” is a mirror reflecting the deep-seated trauma permeating modern life. Yet, like the resilient voices in Scofield’s work, I am determined to break the cycle, to resist the black lizard’s crawl and to tell my story, in all its painful honesty and hopeful resilience.