The Farmer's Bride (Cavatina Sequence) (In Answer To Charlotte Mew) Poem by Gert Strydom

There was a farmer's wife, who was afraid
every day,
was driven wild with unmentioned fear;
always away
she was hidden beyond some lock and key,
never was gay
but doves gathered at her window sill,
many birds fluttered near at her will.

Without much love she was driven to work,
once she did flee
with the farmer and his labourers searching;
she was happy
while she was hiding in the large cornfield,
was from fear free,
later sneaked into the nearest church,
while drunk from the bar her husband did lurch.

Like a small animal she was hiding,
the minister
prayed for her but then took her back home,
quite sinister
acted the farmer as he whipped her,
did register
her into a lunatic asylum
and of his actions that was the sum.

The magpie's feathers did lie in her room
and she was gone
as if she had suddenly taken flight,
had moved on,
one day to a much better loving world,
but all alone
until his sudden death the farmer was,
they found him deep in a field of green grass.

[Reference: 'The Farmer's Bride' by Charlotte Mew.]