The following version of this poem was used to create this guide: Gailey, Jeannine Hall. “Femme Fatale.” Verse Daily, http://www.versedaily.org/2006/femmefatale.shtml. Note that all parenthetical citations refer to the line number from which the quotation is taken.

“Femme Fatale” is a contemporary poem which is heavily inspired by the film noir genre of the early 20th century, but which also draws from Greek and Biblical mythology. This is characteristic of Gailey’s work; she often uses myth, history, and pop culture as motifs throughout her work. The poem follows a group of archetypal “femme fatale” figures, unified through the fourth-person pronoun “we”, who express their negative experiences with men. However, they imply that their power lies in their ability to outlast them.