Woman In The Wind Poem by John Beaton

Woman In The Wind

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Sheets of rusted corrugated iron
clatter in the gusts against its walls—
the black house mossed with memories of childhood.
It passed like sunset blushed across the kyles.
A teenage bride, she wed her next-door neighbour;
one gateway and she crossed her line of blood.
Today that field-gate lies unhinged and fallen,
half-sunk in a half a lifetime's puddled mud
and only washing-line connects the gate-posts.
Three shirts with arms extended tug and flap—
a man, two boys. She sees three crucifixions
and thinks on all the prayers and benedictions
they've counted on to save them from mishap.

Their row-boat rounds the Cregan to the Sound
of Raasay out of Camustianavaig Bay.
Black cormorants, like mourners, watch them pass
behind Ben Tianavaig then fade away.
At tide-change there's a hush as waters still.
Red cod in congregations prey and gulp
the eels that undulate like blowing rags
as hand-lines search their sanctuaries of kelp.
Clouds glisten, haloed by a hidden sun.
The brightness weakens to the creak of oars.
Then wingless shadows fly across the heather,
gray waves of swelling rain bring foul weather
as storms begin to sweep the open moors.

This morning and each morning since she married
she's borne the water-buckets from the burn
to wash away the woad of savage living
expecting neither respite nor return.
From unrelenting slime and sweat and smearings,
she keeps the gate and dares the coming squall,
extracts the wind's last spit-less drying breath;
but now both rain and iron rattle the wall.
In headscarf, tallowed boots, and threadbare coat
she wears for milking and when going for peat
she pulls the clothes-pegs, hoping that it brightens;
instead the cowl of gloom draws in and tightens,
and rainspots on the clothes seal her defeat.

Now serried whitecaps charge the assembled leagues
of shoreline cliffs, then crash like cracks of doomsday
and rise as giant clamshells on the rocks;
though bow to blow, four oars can make no headway.
They slash their grounded lines and blisters tear
from callused hands as limbs and torsos, wood—
one streaming sinewed beast impelled by fear—
resist the pounded Cregan's beatitude.
No bell, just stony silence from the kirk
where ministers tell all they're unforgiven
until they die, then say they've gone to Heaven—
cold comfort as the combers go berserk.

She steps inside and fights to shut the door.
Outside the ravens huddle under haystacks,
and seagulls switchback into battering gales.
The iron sheeting flies. She finds some sacks
and caulks the draughty door, then lifts the wash
and squeezes hard to feel if it's still moist
with water hauled before her men-folk rose;
then clasps these family icons to her breast,
damp armfuls of limp, empty cloth, and knows,
as surely as the sun will set forever
beyond the kyles, as surely as the kirk
will keep its foregone verdicts under cover,
that, whether she must face a widow's grief,
or they return, expecting her relief,
until she dies, one of two Hells awaits her.

Woman In The Wind
Sunday, October 7, 2018
Topic(s) of this poem: hardship,scotland,woman
POET'S NOTES ABOUT THE POEM
In recitation, I introduce this poem as follows:

Come with me to the Scottish Highlands. To the Isle of Skye. There's a bay, and round it is the crofting village of Camustianavaig. It's a time when the people live a simple life, gleaning what they can from the land and supplementing it with fish from the sea. To catch those fish, they have to row heavy wooden boats out of the bay, around a headland called the Cregan, into the open waters of the Sound of Raasay, and along the cliffed shoreline of the mountain behind the village, Ben Tianavaig. And look you now as the village rises to that mountain. There'a a house, and opposite it an old black house so named because the peat fire that burned in it had stained its stones. Between the house and the ruin is a fenceline with a gap where a gate once stood. A wind is blowing. Beside the gap is a woman. This is her story.

My father was raised in that village and I spent all my summers there as a boy. I've been in the boat.

I wrote the poem in recognition of the fact that Highland women bore great hardships but, as far as history is concerned, their heroism is largely unsung.

Each stanza has three parts: two quatrains with the 2nd and 4th lines rhyming, and a final group of 5 lines where the 1st is unrhymed and the last 4 rhyme abba.

The stanzas alternate between the woman's situation and the situation of the father and sons in the boat.

This poem has been published in an ebook and The Hypertexts website and it has been anthologized. There's also a video of me reciting it in live performance.
COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Me Poet Yeps Poet 30 November 2018

This morning and each morning since she married she's borne the water-buckets from the burn to wash away the woad of savage living expecting neither respite nor return. Just beautiful O Canadien Such beaches I too have seen...many rags now from one time's richness some day we may meet at the those shores from some river may be stay friendly

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John Beaton 30 November 2018

Thnanks, Poet Poet. A pleasure to know you connected with this. John

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Kostas Lagos 07 October 2018

Fantastic writing John! Left me speechless!

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