Research article
Author: Judith Stinton (Independent writer)
These two poems reflect on Sylvia Townsend Warner and her milieu. The first recalls an incident about Warner’s burial and the second concerns a later tenant of a house Warner rented in the 1930s.
Keywords: Warner, Chaldon, grave, Miss Green’s Cottage
How to Cite: Stinton, J. (2018) “ Two Poems: Two Stories”, The Journal of the Sylvia Townsend Warner Society. 18(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.14324/111.444.stw.2018.07
These two poems were written after the publication of my book on Chaldon Herring, as people continued to tell me tales. The first, strange, episode was related to me one evening by Colin House, who had been responsible for replacing Sylvia’s stone after her name was added to it. 1 The second story came from Chaldon villager Betty Miller, who had nursed May Pitman. May and her husband Jim were Sylvia’s tenants at Miss Green’s cottage and were blown out, unharmed, by the bomb that destroyed it in 1944. May died of tuberculosis in 1951.
This village has known witches, some fifty years ago. Now hares leap without artifice friezing the fields. Over cottage doors horseshoes disintegrate into rust. The old crafts are gone, it seems, The villagers are at rest.
Until they reach the grave. Here in the churchyard the stones start and jig, cheerfully unquiet.
She was one of their number, the numberless, her soul’s progress barred and blocked by a pair of hinges, crossed, from a whining farm gate.
Turning the handle, worn down to the metal, through creamy layers of paint, and you’ll find the veranda. (That’s where my patient spends most of her time.) She treads those wooden boards, Coughing, talking, Smoking, too, I dare say.
She’s like a bird caught in a net Tearing. Cruel in her distress, Shedding her flightiness, her fine feathers, She’s left the sanatorium. Left it wordless.
Later on, we heard that she’s also left her husband, Taking the furniture, and only three weeks after… I wonder what she wanted with it? Shackling her to death.
