Land of my Ancestors Read online


Land of my Ancestors

  Copyright 2013 Judith Lesley Marshall

  These poems are available in print from Mudfog Press under the title of 'Lifelines.'

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  Appreciation by Bob Beagrie

  "Judith Marshall seeks out the voices of her ancestors that lie in the landscape, found documents, phrases and scraps of memory, and with a deft hand that weaves together the loose threads of family history with her own experience, lets them speak of their loves, their losses, their pains, their hopes, their links to the land and their travels, in an array of authentic tongues."

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  Dedication

  There is an old Greek saying quoted in Captain Corelli's Mandolin that:

  "Men in their generations are like the leaves of a tree. The wind blows and one year's leaves are scattered to the ground; but the trees burst into bud and put on freshness when the springtime comes."

  These poems are dedicated to my ancestors.

  They are intended to be read in one sitting as a re-creation of my journey into family history.

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  Contents

  Invisible Threads

  Homecoming

  When I was young ...

  Green

  Bonny Bits

  T'Owld Man

  View from Cross Fell

  Land of my Ancestors

  No Going Back

  Soul Collecting

  Silhouettes

  Salt of the Earth

  About the Author

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  Invisible Threads

  Cobwebs beaded with dew

  hang from the line

  like snowflakes seen

  through a microscope lens.

  I trace my forefinger

  along each thread,

  dream of weaving

  a mandala

  to magnify patterns

  in my family's life.

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  Homecoming

  While Dad was in hospital

  after a stroke

  I was the one to sort his things

  so he could come home, we hoped,

  to get well again.

  The bedside cabinet held

  a muddle of nails and wire,

  hammers and spanners,

  old notebooks, pencil stubs,

  rolls of scrap paper.

  Unravelling one of the scrolls

  I came face to face

  with three death certificates:

  his father, grandfather,

  and great grandfather.

  I stared at the crinkled pages,

  leads to the story of a past

  that now no one could narrate:

  Dad had been robbed of speech.

  I swallowed back my tears. And then

  a yellowing postcard fluttered out.

  On the front embossed 'Birthday Greetings.'

  On the back the smudged message:

  "To my dear son, from his dad

  who wishes him a happy future."

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  When I was young...

  ... on Sunday mornings

  we visited Lynesack church,

  placed Sweet Williams

  on Granda's grave.

  Forty years later I sought out his plot

  where the stream wells up

  from underground.

  I tip-toed down the spongy path

  between old grave-mounds,

  remembered my fear of sinking

  into a mine tunnel.

  At his headstone

  I found fresh flowers;

  today's kids playing Robin Hood

  for the dead.

  ... on Sunday afternoons

  we went to Evenwood

  for family teas.

  Gran baked the best cakes,

  chocolate, ginger, rice and marble,

  but we had to eat our sandwiches first,

  egg, beetroot, or cheese.

  We walked over the back fields

  to pick buttercups, daisies and clover,

  which we pressed in scrapbooks

  that smelt of dried grass.

  One day the coke ovens let out.

  We crouched with held breath;

  thick grey clouds engulfed us

  in the stench of rotten eggs.

  We returned with sore eyes,

  bad heads, hacking coughs,

  our wild flowers wilted

  like overcooked greens.

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  Green

  I did not inherit Granda's skill

  for showing Cleopatras,

  the prize leeks he soaked in pails of milk

  to turn their skins lily-white

  or his knack for raising chrysanths,

  loud multi-coloured pompoms

  that would make any cheer leader proud.

  He had a string of winner's rosettes

  longer than Gran's washing line.

  At our brand new house,

  a green-fingered friend helped me design

  a Feng Shui garden,

  taught me how to dig a trench,

  sow, prick out and plant.

  Oriental poppies grew like triffids

  and green gladioli came up pink.

  Now I let Nature take her course.

  The kitchen window frames

  snowdrops, crocus, bluebells,

  daffodils, tulips, forget-me-nots,

  a host of golden dandelions

  and purple ones with no name

  I think I've seen the like of

  in a border down the hill.

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  Bonny Bits

  Today I browsed a gift shop,

  bought zebra rock from Brazil,

  added it to my collection of crystal coals,

  stood back to watch them sparkle

  in the flickering electric fire,

  realised I'd made a spar box,

  just like t'Owld Men who dowsed for lead,

  filled their pockets with 'bonny bits,'

  shaped them by candle light

  until coal became the new black gold.

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  T'Owld Man

  Life was hard

  up on t'moors,

  summers was short,

  winters lang,

  it rained for half

  of iv'ry year

  but one day

  ye might strike it lucky.

  When t'prices crashed

  we was forced

  te leave t'dale

  te work in t'colpitts.

  We learnt te crawl

  not stand te hew

  int'dark 'n' damp

  wi' picks 'n' hammers

  brought fro' home,

  fro' side te side,

  not up 'n' down

  in dank tunnels.

  Watter iv'rywhere,

  on t'floor, on t'walls,

  drippin' down t'props,

  ont' rooves.

  We got te know

  t'cracks 'n' groans

  o' pine as well as

  t'candle flickers.

  I missed t'hills

  but t'money was better,

  t'lads settled

  wi' bairns a piece.

  Our lass was dead,

  family out o' touch.

  There was nothin'

  te go back for.

  I took te t'pipe

  te kill t'cough,

  walked by t'banks

  o' t'Gaunless,

  watched steam trains

  haulin' coal along

  t'Hagger Leazes

  line ...

  Waited for t'days

  te pan out,

  listened for
you

  te call me home.

  When t'time came

  I was a while

  lettin' go

  o' t'dark.

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  View from Cross Fell

  Sheep tracks meshed

  with man-made welts

  morph into Nazca lines

  in valleys carved by ice.

  The land below is riddled

  with rises, levels and shafts,

  a scaffold of tunnels

  that echo no sound.

  Spoil heaps hide hollow holes

  where many have fallen

  into the Boggart's trap,

  left their bones to rot.

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  Land of my Ancestors

  My mother's dale is windswept,

  waterlogged, barren land,

  that reminded her folk

  of their native homes,

  where Icelandic currents

  swept across the tundra,

  just like those that skim

  the snowy summits of Cross Fell.

  I brace myself against the elements,

  scan the limestone crags

  dissected by burns and sikes

  hidden in the heather.

  Peat suckers my feet,

  I sink into my roots

  until a slap on the cheek

  from an icy gust spurs me on.

  I shrug my black woollen hat over my ears,

  trudge through blanket bog,

  think of those who endured

  this daily slog to work,

  do not stop to admire the marsh marigolds,

  the saxifrage or alpine forget-me-nots,

  do not register the calls of black grouse,

  curlew, lapwing and plover.

  On the outskirts of Garrigill,

  trees baized in reindeer moss

  take me over the purple tops

  to my father's dale

  where pine needles coated in white dust,

  as if from falls of volcanic ash,

  carpet the old miners' paths.

  My forefathers carved wheals

  into the surrounding hills,

  scarred by glacial erosion,

  transformed the backbone of England

  into the vertebrae of a dragon

  whose spine glints where mineral veins

  were exposed by the hushing

  of fluorite, galena and quartz.

  ***~~~***

  No Going Back

  The Great Hall of the Winds

  hides in the hills

  where ravens go to roost.

  You showed me the path

  through the veil of spume

  from the waterfall.

  I followed into the cave

  to see the bone chamber

  where lions once lived.

  You helped me down the slope

  of scree which skitter-scattered

  to the cavern floor.

  I stumbled over mud and rubble,

  grazed my shin

  on a stalagmite.

  The Great Hall lit up

  when you swept your torch

  across the roof,

  startling a thousand diamonds

  like a glitter of fairy lights,

  from their limestone bed.

  I froze at the first echoes

  of tapping sounds,

  the dwarves looking for lead

  Then ran like Aeolus himself,

  did not look back

  to see if you would follow.

  You were a long time

  coming up from underground,

  your face a blank.

  The waterfall hissed,

  ravens took flight,

  something shifted between us.

  ***~~~***

  Soul Collecting

  "If you want to talk to old relatives,

  go to Staindrop churchyard," Mam said,

  "There's a nation of them buried there."

  I never went for fear of collecting the wrong souls.

  How would I know which Arthur, Tom or Mary

  was our Arthur, Tom and Mary?

  Alice sought me out,

  when I wasn't looking for her.

  Alice, Alles and Allaes

  kept popping up in every search,

  the long lost wife

  of great, great, great uncle John,

  and another surprise,

  her maiden name belonged

  to the other side of the family.

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  Silhouettes

  Records say there are twins

  on both sides of the tree;

  faces not found

  in the photo box.

  Born alive or dead,

  boys fail to survive;

  their stories lost

  from our family.

  You should have been James,

  your sister's blonde-haired,

  blue-eyed double -

  our first born son.

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  Salt of the Earth

  They worked hard,

  they played hard,

  both in the dark

  and in the light,

  shared secrets

  'bout showin' leeks,

  readin' teacups,

  makin' ends meet,

  but of all the games

  my family played,

  snakes and ladders

  best describes

  their quest to mine

  a golden seam.

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  About the Author

  Judith was born and brought up in Bishop Auckland, Co. Durham. She had a varied career as a modern languages lecturer, complementary therapist and senior library officer before setting up as a freelance creative writing coach in 2010.

  Her work is inspired by travel and mythology as well as local and family history. If you enjoyed this collection you might like to download 'Twisting in the Land of Light' which is written as a fantasy poetry story set in modern Greece.

  Fiction titles include:

  'At the Gates' - a short story about a young man who enters an English monastery in search of a better life and ends up trapped in time.

  'Zipangu, Year of the Dog 1274: The Second Wave' - a novella set in ancient Japan at the time of the first Mongol invasion. This is the story of Chen who is washed up on the beach and evades capture until the second invasion some six years later.