It’s getting very dark and cold now. But it will only be ten days from now that the sun begins to return to my corner of the world. The dying year will finally have faded and the new one will begin to grow. The days will get longer, the first signs of spring will follow, and then it will be time to put seeds into the ground once more. This thought of sunreturn makes the winter seem shorter, and easier to bear.
I have been reflecting on art and meaning. Yes, all right, I know.
A recent radio programme featured an experimental artist who refused to elaborate on the “meaning” of his work since, as Bacon apparently said, the meaning does not become apparent until later on. But whose meaning? And doesn’t it matter what the artist meant? These are (so I understand, not being as highbrow as people usually are when they talk about this stuff) age old questions. I’m not necessarily that interested in finding the answers. But the question came to mind again today and I thought it was interesting to notice how we do in fact take our own meaning from things.
Take, for example, religion – perhaps we enjoy the music, the art, the stories for themselves, without subscribing to their “meaning”, or to the beliefs that inspired them in the first place.
We sang Morning Has Broken at school (Come and Praise!) and I still hum it now and then:
Morning has broken like the first morning;
Blackbird has spoken like the first bird.
Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning!
Praise for them springing fresh from the Word!Sweet the rain’s new fall sunlit from heaven,
Like the first dewfall on the first grass.
Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden,
Sprung in completeness where His feet pass.Mine is the sunlight! Mine is the morning,
Born of the one light Eden saw play!
Praise with elation; praise ev’ry morning,
God’s recreation of the new day!
Clearly when Eleanour Farjeon wrote this back in 1922 (no, it wasn’t Cat Stevens after all) she meant it as a hymn of praise to the Christian god. And as an adult, I can clearly grasp that and I can use my knowledge and my analytical skills to understand that Farjeon wanted to emphasise that these wonders of creation are eternal, that the sweet glories of the early morning can almost literally transport us to the paradise of Eden because, in all the time of the world, this has not changed. The blackbird of our morning today is, absolutely literally, just like the first blackbird of the first morning in Eden – eternally. Which is all kind of nice, in a loyal but totally unscientific and anti-evolutionary kind of way.
Fortunately, as a child, this meaning escaped me. I did not take the song literally. I saw in it a celebration of the newness of each morning, not the recreation of another morning long past, before I even lived. I didn’t love the cold green of the morning because it was exactly like some other, previous day, but for precisely the opposite reason. I loved it because it was new – full of promise and possibility – beautiful – exciting – fresh!
I still prefer my meaning.
Infinitely.
My name is Jody and this is my house.
It’s a really old house. Really old. It’s seen so many generations, and mostly in my family, more or less. I’ve lived here since my Gran died. The cousins all wanted to sell it, and they sold it to me.
This house has seen children be born and grow up, it’s seen good times and bad times, and it has memories, all sorts of memories. It’s seen houses around it be built and lived in and then, in time, knocked down to make way for new houses. But this house has never been knocked down. I love this house and it, I think, loves me. Some might think that all sounds a bit odd, but it isn’t. Let me tell you a story about my house, a true story that happened on Hallowe’en night many, many years ago, when my great great great great grandmother was a little girl and she was living in the house with her family. That’s four greats. It was more than a hundred years ago, and the house was old even then, old and creaky.
In those days people went to church all the time, everybody did, and the priest told them that All Hallow’s Eve was a night for remembering saints and thinking about departed souls, people who have died and (so the vicar said) gone to heaven to be with God. And the people imagined it, the souls of the dead, flying through the night to escape the grave and join the angels. They believed in howling ghosts and wicked witches and all sorts of things that you and I know are just pretend. There’s no such thing really as howling ghosts, because ghosts are only memories, or dreams, or the half-felt touch of a friend we thought we’d lost. And all the witches that we know are nice women who want to make the world a better place. But people didn’t go to school in those days, hardly anyone went to school, and they never learned much science. So they believed in all sorts of things you or I might think silly, if the priest told them it was true, whether he was sober or no. And so, on Hallowe’en night, the people were afraid of what might be racing with the wind above their roofs.
It was a wet and windy night with a fat moon in the sky, hidden by thick, dark clouds full of thunder and lightening. The sky would clear a little now and again to show the moon, and then the bits of cloud blew across the moon so fast they seemed to flit like bats. The family had closed the windows and pulled wooden shutters across them to keep out the noise of the wind. They had bolted the doors and drawn heavy curtains across to stop up the gaps and keep in the warmth from the hot kitchen fire. There was a woman knitting warm socks to keep the family cosy through winter, and a man mending a hole in the bottom of his favourite trousers. My five times great grandmother and my five times great grandfather. They were thinking their own thoughts for the dead, for their little son who had died of a fever that summer. He was two. He had brown hair and a little blue hat that he loved.
Their younger son, a baby, was asleep in a basket on the rug, and there was a little girl who was old enough to stay up. My four times great grandmother. She was using her finger to draw pictures in the ash she had spread out on the hearth of the fire. Sometimes she might practice writing. Not many little girls could read or write in those days and she was proud that her father was teaching her how. Her name was Sophie.
The family were peaceful, and warm, and Sophie was just beginning to feel like yawning when there was a loud banging and hammering at the door. Everyone jumped and looked at each other, surprised. Who could be out on a night like this, so late? They were farming people, and their nearest neighbours were the Mabbots, at least half a mile away even if you went straight across the fields without being careful to walk around by the hedges. Whoever was at the door was banging away and shouting too: “Let me in! let me in!”
Sophie’s father stood up and went to the door.
“Who is it?” he called.
“It’s me! Oh, William Brant, it’s me, your neighbour, Mary Mabbot! Please let me in!”
William quickly opened the door, and she came in with her baby in her arms, a little thing that clung to her like a tick. They were wet and cold and frightened.
“Mary, what is it? Where’s John?” asked Sophie’s mother. “Let me get you a blanket, and something dry for little Joany to wear.”
And while Sophie’s mother fussed around her, Mary stuttered out her story.
The others listened, shocked, and Sophie’s father would say from time to time – “Robbers!” or “On a night like this!” or her mother would say – “What can he be thinking of?” or “Oh, what will become of them?” Sophie said nothing, but only listened.
And this was what had happened: Mary’s husband, John Mabbot, had heard noise outside their farmhouse. He was worried about his cows, because he had heard stories of cattle thieves and the noise came from the direction of the cowshed. So he had taken his two grownup sons, Ben and Josiah, who worked on the farm, and they had gone off to see what was happening. Mary had waited at home, frightened to death for her family, and none of them had come back. There had been some shouting, a terrible echoing bang, and then it had gone quiet, and then she had heard more shouting, strange voices, coming nearer to the house. She had not waited to find out who it was, because she had been so afraid of what had happened to John and the boys, and what would happen to her and the baby if these strangers had come to the house and found them there alone. She had taken up the baby and hurried out into the wild night, hoping to call on the protection of her neighbours.
When the story was told, Sophie’s father was silent for a moment. Then he said – “So John and Ben and Josiah are all out in the storm, and there are lawless men about, and who knows what danger there is for us, too.” They all looked at one another, afraid, and nobody knew what to do. There were no police in those days, and no telephones either, so there wasn’t much they could do, except stay where they were or go out into the night. William went upstairs to look out of the windows. There was nothing to see. Then he walked all around the house to be sure that every door was bolted and every window fastened tight with shutters closed. Then he came back to the kitchen, where both babies were sleeping, and both mothers were anxiously listening to the sounds outside the house, and Sophie was watching it all and wondering what terrible thing might happen next. Her father came in and stood uncertainly in the middle of the room.
“I’m going to go and see if I can find John and the lads. See to it that the door is properly bolted behind me.”
“No, William! Stay here!” cried Sophie’s mother. “It’s too dangerous, what if you find those men instead? What if they come here next? What about the storm?”
“I’m sure you will be safe in here, the doors and windows are all soundly bolted.”
“But what about you, out there?”
“There are three good men out there, Lucy, and they might need help.”
“But it’s Hallowe’en!”
“Then I’ll take the bible.” William looked grim, and Sophie’s mother knew it was useless to argue, so she fetched his overcoat and walking stick, and a little pocket bible.
“If you must go,” she said. “Walk, don’t take a horse. That way you can hide if the robbers are still about. Oh, William, please be careful.”
“I will, Lucy” he said, but before he went, he made sure to give her a tender kiss, and Sophie too, and a gentle finger to stroke baby George’s cheek. He knew it was dangerous, going out, and he wanted to have something fond in his mind as he went.
With the door safely bolted behind William, the house seemed quiet. All those who were awake were listening to the wind and the thunder, hoping not to hear anything else, no sounds of shouting or of the approach of strangers. Sophie wanted to peep outside, but she did not dare open a shutter, even if she had thought that her mother would let her. They listened. Lucy and Mary had picked up their babies, wanting to keep them close, and Sophie sat on the rug by the fire in their circle. They listened. All were tired, but none thought of going to bed. Sophie’s mother made tea and brought out some bread and butter.
“What was that?” said Sophie, suddenly.
“What?” started Mary. “I didn’t hear anything.”
“Listen,” said Sophie’s mother, and they did.
Outside, there were people coming up the lane from the direction of Mabbot’s farm. They were not cattle thieves, but they were not good men. They were hard, and desperate, and determined. They had run away from a navy ship in dock fifty miles to the south and were tramping across the country to escape being captured by the authorities and punished for deserting their ship. They were hungry and cold, and they feared capture above all.
At Mabbot’s farm they had decided to shelter in the cowshed, but the cows, already upset by the storm, had been terrified and started up a great mooing and running about. This is what the Mabbots had heard. When they came into the shed, the deserters rushed towards them, and perhaps they were trying to run out of the shed but in the end what happened was that all the men fell to fighting. They had guns, the sailors, and one of them, young Joe, panicked and fired his gun at Josiah. His leg was badly hurt. Ben had been knocked out cold and John too was lying on the floor, groaning with pain. The navy men ran for it, and left the farmers in the cowshed, where they stayed until William found them over an hour later.
Meanwhile, the navy deserters realised that they would be wanted men now, criminals. They were especially angry at Joe. I’m not sure if they were angry for the damage done to the Mabbot family or for the loss of any chance they might have had to beg for food in the neighbourhood. Either way, when they saw the farmhouse they at once planned to rob it and steal food. They found it empty and raided the kitchen. They ate a little, gulping what they found on the table, but did not know how badly they had injured the Mabbots, or how soon they might return and raise the alarm. So they knew they must move on quickly, took what they could carry, and continued along the lane.
Going that way, instead of by the paths across the fields, it took them much longer to get to the Brant house than it had taken Mary, even though she was not strong and they were men in fighting shape. But they did get there, and it was these approaching men that Sophie heard. Footsteps, a cough, small noises that carry even in a storm, even when a few hard men have seen a light and decided to approach in secret.
Inside the house, they listened. It is hard to imagine how tense it must have been, how silent. Sophie, Lucy and Mary were so desperate to know what was happening outside but had only their ears to use. Each was thinking of their own family out in the storm, fearing the approach of robbers, fearing that their loved ones would be lost and would not come. Each was straining with every nerve and fibre in their stretched bodies for some clue of what would happen next, without knowing if anything would happen at all, or if it was all a trick of the wind and the night.
Sophie suddenly remembered: “In the front bedroom, there is a gap under the shutter. Perhaps we could see something.”
Nobody wanted to leave the security of the warm kitchen. They were afraid of the dark and the cold upstairs, perhaps even more than they were afraid of what they thought might be happening outside. Yet they wanted to know, and so they got up and all of them went to the foot of the stairs, none wanting to be left behind, taking the babies too.
“No!” said Sophie’s mother to Mary. “No candle, no light. It will be seen from outside. We will have to go in the dark.”
They would have to go in pitch dark, feeling their way and remembering what was where, and hoping not to trip and fall. Sophie took her mother’s hand, and Mary took Sophie’s other hand, and they went. In the bedroom, they found that Sophie was right – there was a gap at the bottom of the shutter. Yet because of the wide stone windowsill, you had to get your head right down onto the sill, sideways, and look out through the gap with one eye. Only Sophie was small enough to do it. She peeped out, and gasped.
“What can you see?” whispered Mary urgently.
“There are some people down there.”
“How many?”
“One, two, four – five of them.”
“What are they doing?”
“They’re in the yard. Three of them are over by the stables, one is looking at the barn, he’s trying to get in I think. The other one is in the road looking about. I suppose he is looking to see if anyone is coming near.”
“Not much chance of that, not tonight.”
Mary made a small noise, like a whimper of dread. Lucy gripped the windowsill.
“What now?”
“The one by the barn, he’s gone inside now. The stable ones, they’re letting the horses out. Thistle is out now, she’s going over to the lane, one of the men has got her and she isn’t frightened a bit! Jolly doesn’t want to come out. The man has gone in. Jolly hasn’t come out yet. Oh – the man in the barn. I think he’s got some oats. Now Jolly will come out. He’s greedy even in a storm! They’ve got a halter on both of them now. And a saddle on Thistle. They’re stealing our horses!”
“If that’s all they do, we’ll have the Lord to thank.”
But as Sophie watched and relayed what she saw to her mother and to Mary, she realised that getting the horses was only the first part. The men were talking, they seemed to be arguing but quietly because they didn’t want to make any noise. They kept looking at the house. Then they seemed to reach a decision. Two of the men mounted the horses and rode away. One stayed in the lane, the lookout. And the other two began to approach the house.
“What’ll we do?!” cried Mary. Sophie was trembling.
“We’ll be quiet,” said Sophie’s mother. “We mustn’t let them know who is or isn’t in the house, or how many of us there are, or where we are.”
Sophie and Mary were quiet. Lucy seemed to grow in front of them, calmly knowing what to do, even when they were all dreadfully afraid.
“And we must make sure the children are hidden,” she continued. “Sophie, take the baby. Go up into the attic, both of you. Make sure they are completely quiet!”
“Mama, what will you do?” asked Sophie.
“Never you mind, just do as I say! And don’t be afraid. The house will keep us safe. My family have lived here for a hundred years, and no robbers have been inside it yet!”
Sophie was amazed at her mother – so homely in ordinary times, yet so assured now, taking on a look of certainty that Sophie had never seen before. Beside her, Mary, even though she was the older woman, seemed to shrink and become a child. Sophie took her little brother and hugged her mother. It was hard not to be afraid at all, but she was no longer trembling.
So Sophie and Mary together carried George and Joany up into the attic. It was a little room in the roof-space where Sophie’s mother kept apples and potatoes and china and bed-linen and all sorts of other things. They had to fumble about in the dark, and Sophie couldn’t find the blanket box. She found a bedspread and gave it to Mary.
“Here, take George,” she whispered. “I’m going to get blankets.”
Mary took hold of her, catching her dress: “You stay too. You heard what your mother said, and we can share this bedspread.”
“It’s not big enough,” said Sophie. “Anyway, she said the house will keep us safe, didn’t she? I’ll get an extra blanket from the bedroom, to keep us warm. I’ll be back soon.”
“It isn’t safe!”
“Yes it is,” insisted Sophie. “Didn’t she say so? And I won’t be long. What about mother, down there on her own? Isn’t she safe?”
Mary had no answer, for she knew no more than Sophie, and reluctantly she let her go, quietly, back through the hatch and down to the bottom of the attic steps.
Sophie crept back into the bedroom and wrapped the bedspread around her shivering body. She looked guiltily back towards the attic and then put her eye to the gap at the shutter. In the minutes she had been away from the window, the two men by the house had been circling it, looking for a way in, trying to gauge who was inside. They had attacked three men, shot one, robbed a house and stolen food, all in one night. They were lost men and the one clear idea in their minds was to get what they needed and to hide out in the country, hoping that eventually they might tramp somehow to a new place. And so Sophie saw them, talking urgently, looking at the door or pointing to the window. She could see they were deciding something, whether or how to break into the house. Her house. This house.
What could her mother be doing? Sophie tried to think hard, and she asked herself why they were hiding if the house was so safe. And why, if they really were in danger, her mother was not hiding. Did she have a plan? It was terrible to be up in the cold and dark and not to know. All at once, she decided to creep downstairs. She would not show herself, in case her mother was angry, but she wanted to see. Glancing back guiltily towards the attic, she walked softly down the stairs, careful not to let them creak beneath her.
She was nearly half way down, on the sixth step, when all at once she heard a loud knocking at the door. Then a man’s voice – from inside the house! The voice called out – “Who is it?” Sophie shrank back in shock, and then thought for a moment that her father had returned and brought the others back with him, but she realised just as quickly that this was impossible. Who could it be? Surely not one of the robbers?!
There was a loud knocking again and voices:
“We are travellers, seeking shelter from the storm.” They were trying to trick their way in!
The mysterious man downstairs replied, and suddenly Sophie understood that it was her own mother, speaking in a new voice – a deep voice, a man’s voice – so that the men outside would not realise that there were only women inside. Lucy was trying to trick them into thinking she was a man. Sophie was delighted with her mother.
“I’ll not open up for strangers on Hallowe’en night,” said her man-mother. She tried to sound confident, masculine. “You can rest awhile in the barn if you wish, and sleep there too if it suits.”
There was a pause, a silence while Sophie held her breath and prayed that the strange men would give up now. She had begun to feel that if they wanted to break down the door they could, that only her mother’s trickery protected them.
“We’re cold, good sir.” replied the outside voice. Sir! Thank heavens. “We are just men, not ghouls. Is there a drop of tea in the house for a cold man out in the storm? We’d be most obliged to you, sir, most obliged.”
“I beg your pardon, sirs. I say I’ll not open up this night. Tea in the morning, if you want it, or you can trek along to Mabbots farm half a mile further. He’s more fool than me.”
All this time the storm was raging outside, and if anything it became more frightening, as Sophie huddled motionless on the stairs, amazed at her mother’s unsuspected audacity. Would it work? There was a thunderclap, and then the answer came.
Their ruse had failed, but the men outside were not giving up. Quite the opposite – there was a tremendous bang, an earsplitting noise, and then another one. Both Sophie and, down the stairs, her mother, cried out. Sophie had never heard a gun being fired before, but that was exactly what it was, as one of the men, or maybe both of them, shot at the door, aiming to break the lock and dislodge the bolt. There were two bolts. Did they have another shot to fire? There was an endless silence, and Sophie held her breath, bit her lip, held onto the wall like death. She did not know what was happening, and it terrified her all the same. Lucy did know what was happening. And she knew that if the men could shoot off the second bolt they would have no defence left: there was nothing to do but pray. Were they re-loading, or out of ammunition?
Lucy dropped to her knees, thinking only of prayer. In fact, so weak with fear and horror, she fell headlong to the floor and pressed her body into the stone flags. She forgot about God, she forgot the church, she forgot the sermons of the drunken priest. They could not save her, or her children, or her friend. More lightning, more thunder. She thought only of the house, which had kept her safe and her family safe so many years, and the bolt, the one last bolt that held the door fast.
“House, house,” she moaned. “Oh, keep us safe. House, my house, protect us, please keep us safe. House, house, protect us. House, house, keep us safe.”
Sophie heard these words and they echoed into her mind, into her body even. House, house, protect us – she found herself repeating the words and pressing her own body into the wall where she crouched, half-paralysed with fear on the sixth step down. She felt suddenly as those this wall, this stone was the most important thing in the world. Not her mother’s audacity now, but the very fabric of this building, the very breath of her body, were what their lives depended on. She felt – surrounded – by all the people that this house had ever kept safe. House, house, our house, protect us, please keep us safe.
There was another shot. Time stopped.
Lucy was suddenly aware of herself, praying to a house of stone. The door, signalling an end to its stout resistance, sagged almost imperceptibly on its hinges. And Sophie muttered on - house, house, protect us.
Outside, time had not stopped, and the door was ajar. The robbers were almost sure now that nobody in the house would resist them. They glanced up at a flash of lightning as the man who had shot through the last defence stepped to the door and put up his hand to push it open. Fssshh! He leapt back, yelled in pain. What was that?
Inside the house, Lucy was still waiting for the door to open. She heard the shout and still the door did not open. At last, she began to think again. The carving knife. A stout pan. Hot coals. Too many mugs, hide them in the sink. Why don’t they come in?
House, house, house, house.
The man’s companion helped him up, and saw his burned hand. “The door…”
These were not superstitious men. Superstitious men do not go out robbing on Halloween night. But the burned man was frightened, and the thunderstorm began to panic him.
“Bill, the door…”
“Never mind that,” said Bill gruffly. “You’re in a fit. Go back to the road. Send Joe.”
When Joe came: “Lost his nerve. Come on.”
And so they tried again. But as soon as Bill touched the door – fssshh! Again – another man leaping back in pain, the house had burned him too.
These were not superstitious men, but they were not fools either. They ran. Lucy, crouching by the fire now with her weaponry assembled, heard them go. Heard the shouting and the running. She went to the door – it was too dark to see much, but there were shapes disappearing into the night. She shut the door and sank to her knees. Thank God.
House, house, house, house.
For the first time, she heard the voice of her daughter. She rushed to the stairs and in the dim light from kitchen saw Sophie there. She was crouched, still, pressed so hard to the wall that she seemed almost to be a part of the stone. As Lucy came to her, she saw that Sophie was unmoving, welded to the wall. Her face was ashen and, despite the bedspread still hung around her, she was cold as stone.
“Sophie, Sophie,” said Lucy, holding her daughter. “Sophie, it’s all right now. They’ve gone. We’re safe.” Gently, she prised her from the wall and lifted her, carried her down the stairs to the warmth of the fire. Gradually, Sophie seemed to come to herself.
“What happened?” she asked. “Did the house keep us safe? Like you said it would?”
Lucy looked again at the door, reaching for a rational explanation. ” They ran away,” she said. “I think… I think it was the lightning. Or – maybe they were just frightened. I don’t know. They just ran away.”
Sophie listened, but she did not need a rational explanation. She moved to the wall, above the fire, warm stone, and touched it again: “Thank you, house.”
Nobody ever did know for sure what happened that night: perhaps the house was struck by lightning. Local scientists have tried to prove that the door could have been electrified by lightning and burned the robbers. Every year, when science week comes around at the local museum, there is a new theory to talk about. But Sophie always firmly believed, lightning or no, that the house had indeed protected them, that it had some power to keep its loved ones safe. She sometimes thought she could feel their ghosts in the walls, all those long-dead loved ones, like a history of imaginary sisters.
And, after all, the house still stands. My house.
If I said I thought I had a fabulous body -
would you hold it against me?
If I clarified that I mean to say
that I’m only amazed -
amazed -
would you hold it against me?
I don’t mean sexy
like a pornstar,
a groomed and glistening hole
pretending to be whatever you want me to be…
I mean strong
like muscle
and gristle
and bone.
Solid.
I don’t mean beautiful
like a simpering photoshoot fantasy,
all ornamental surface,
so thin I may as well not be here at all -
I mean bloody,
like the reality of sinews and fat and lungs
shot through with the power of breath and heartbeat
so alive I think I never want to go.
The dark is pressing – shifting – chill -
a cloud that spreads against our will.
Its clammy kiss is in the wind -
whispering – that we have sinned.
It seeps through walls – it creeps through doors -
it flows in through our very pores.
There’s nowhere clean, there’s no escape -
it is a slow, an endless rape.
It is the dry. It is the wet.
It fills us up so we forget.
We suck it up, we breathe it in -
we whisper – that we like to sin.
It’s gentle, gentle – we declare -
It is just water – and just air.
