A Shadow in Yucatan Read online

  The puckered old mouth twitches, the apron’s quickly smoothed...

  Restraints, sharp reined, un-sluice the weir dammed by sympathy...

  The gorged stomach of injustice heaves, all barriers collapse...

  The old nurse finds herself close held to the mother’s aching breast.

  Infancy

  Past weeks have been timeless with sleep, sedated in dreamlessness; existence weighted beneath a stone, cast in a still mill-pool.

  The skin on the surface pricked by a nymph, surfacing only to share the solace of meals, before submerging again.

  The future is shorn of impetus, the past of relevance.

  The quicksand of the present is a drugged oblivion.

  Miriam rocks, with tapping feet, pushing the needle home.

  It is a ravelling of faith, that the garment will be worn.

  *****

  There are signs of dim intelligence, (the observance of the squirrel’s track down from the wire to the wall); the foot outstretched to the threadbare warmth; the start to the blue jay’s call.

  Nothing of news is newsworthy, no import far from home...

  The unthinking gaze is focussed on the edge of a wrapping shawl.

  So what do I do to resurrect where help is hopelessness?

  The future must teach forgetfulness, but should she try to forget?

  Life must go on, if it happens that way, there’s no sense in aimlessness.

  This afternoon we go for a walk, down to the beach and back.

  If she resists I’ll tell her straight...I need the exercise.

  There is no hook to recover resolve from the bottomless pit of despair.

  Lethargy, that toothless crone, skims perpetual indifference from the cream of richer care.

  Convalescence must be shamed into shouldering its load.

  Without the swinging carrot, it’s like flailing at the dead.

  Nevertheless it must be done.

  Without slackening the rein, the stubborn white-eyed yearling led to walk again.

  Miriam, as smithy, blows on tempered common-sense.

  Stephanie, wordless, accepts the fetlock’s added strength.

  ‘In two weeks, you go back to work...the routine will be therapy, unthinking, automatic...

  In time you can think again...You’ve just had a vacation...Anyway, nobody will ask.’

  Adolescence

  Two days have been walked with a sandal step, lighter for inconsequence and the competent salad of hands.

  Busy enough to free the mind to turn turtle in the wind.

  The wind was unexpected, gusty and fresh off the sea, following her puppy skirt, sneezing, with overlarge feet.

  The crossbred runt of a pedigree, remote in the frame of time, fickle precocious companion, joyfully reprieved from grief, to snout papers up the street.

  It may come alright in the end.

  *****

  Solitude is the centre of sane, in a circle of meaninglessness.

  Activity transcribes an arc, that returns to itself when spent.

  Alone I can move without shifting

  Alone I can see and stay blind

  Alone I can float paper boats down the tramways of cataract mind.

  Only talk, and the flick-knife question

  the nailed boot, and sprayed shot of converse

  leaves me insensate, raw, and pleading for a word to end all words.

  I must learn to wait for the water. I must free my ear to vibrate.

  I must accompany with moistened tongue, the voices of time and space.

  But do not ask me to talk to the people, for I cannot discern what they say.

  Maturity

  On the third day, quick as a fox, came a woman in a brush of wind.

  Soft-spoken and expensive, the scarf that fell to the floor was silk, and she recovered it, before she perched near the door.

  She was directed soon to Stephanie, relieved by her air of haste.

  She would not want trivial talk, and that was a relief.

  Familiar from a distance, but more composed than before...

  She looked...well, neater?...economical? It was hard to say...

  Her crows-feet deepened when she smiled.

  Younger, half-ironic?

  No, more like half amused.

  Stephanie tied the gingham cape, and gently sat her back.

  The hazel eyes in the mirror observed as she tidied the crown with the tail of a comb, before voicing a plea, with a click of deprecation and a part apology...

  ‘I don’t have too much time, I’m afraid, so could you just wet and trim it, and leave it to blow dry...It more or-less takes care of itself, and there’s a good strong breeze outside.’

  Stephanie followed the arc of the natural curl, by letting it fall from the comb.

  Without further fuss rotated the chair, commenced to balance hot and cold, and deftly used the shower.

  The pointed shears tapered the hair down to the nape and the cheek. Spicules of the glossy cap fell steadily and thick.

  Fingers sifted a good loose scalp...

  A palm pressed the neck into flex so the unswerving eyes in the mirror were extinguished in their sockets by the angle of the brow....

  ‘It’s sometime since you’ve had it cut; the ends are starting to split...’

  ‘Yes, I’ve been so caught up with the baby...I just haven’t had a chance to venture out, to work upon myself.’

  Stephanie slowed but continued, forcing herself to speak,

  ‘They always say a baby plays havoc with your hair...still you wouldn’t have it otherwise...and I guess having him compensates.’

  The woman at these simple words suddenly seemed to expand, her thin shoulders that had sat four-square, melted into her lap.

  ‘Oh he’s a perfect angel, no real trouble at all...only he’s asleep all day, and far too cheerful at night...Say would you like to see him? He’s in his carriage outside. I try so hard not to be the proud mom...but I need the smallest excuse...’

  ‘I don’t think I should step outside. I haven’t been back long...’

  ‘Oh pay no heed to Renee, I’ve known her quite a while...Anyway I’ll bring him in...don’t worry now, you’ve finished...I reckon that’ll do...’

  Already she’d leant forward and was fiddling with bows.

  Stephanie bent over to retrieve an irrelevant pin, straightened up decisively, and finished dusting the neck...

  She untied the apron, swung the chair, taking two steps back...

  ‘I’d love to see your baby’

  ‘Good, I’ll go fetch him’

  Still she hung like a marionette, suspended from a hook. No matter how she struggled she could not touch the ground...

  while all around swum silent fish, on the other side of glass.

  Mrs. Armstrong retreated, in a slim brown summer suit.

  Her ankles were pared to articulate bones, her feet cherished in calf.

  She bent for a word with Renee, who nodded, and then smiled... Laid her leather purse upon the desk, and disappeared outside.

  The door swung to behind a crisply pleated skirt.

  *****

  She returned a second later, with a sari of a shawl in the heart of which was a lily rose, leafed in finely spun lace...

  In spite of confusion and panic, Stephanie gazed at the face, as smooth as a Flemish virgin, cool as the skin of a grape.

  It had flushed on a winter of strawberries, and woken out of sleep...

  It drew her like a truth in the night, and her feet into slow approach.

  Renée bobbed and clattered

  Idle girls all shuffled round

  ‘Oh isn’t he jus darling!’

  ‘Ah really think he’s cute’

  ‘Say, he has the littlest ears...’

  Mrs. Armstrong turned to Stephanie

  ‘Well tell us what you think?’

  ‘I think he’s very beautiful...’ a small hand gripped her thumb, ’what name have you called him?�
��

  ‘Well his name is Christopher...but that wasn’t up to us...that’s what his mother had him called...we adopted him you see...

  But you’re my precious darling, aren’t you my sweetie?

  She must have been a wonderful girl, you can see that he’s been loved...she even wrote a letter... Wait, I have it in my purse...say, could you hold him a minute?’

  She raised her cradle shoulder and dropped the child into his mother’s waiting arms.

  *****

  His glance was calm, uncurious.

  He perused the new found face.

  His pagoda gaze was a sage of sky, reflecting ancient pools, encompassing all, and un-perplexed.

  He stilled bewilderment.

  She, spiralling larks, and a hover of hawk, sank down upon a chair...

  Christopher lay like a frond of green fern, across her lap of light, gripped her finger tighter, and paddled both his legs.

  Nobody noticed the mother and child, communing and entranced.

  Nor how reverently she stroked his cheek, and softly kissed his brow.

  They were held in the palm of an upraised hand in a circle of blessedness,

  alone in a triptych of frescoed gilt...

  While the letter was passed round.

  Bandied for curious scrutiny, and a passage read aloud.

  Stephanie flowed with infinite love which infused the golden child, who gently turned against her breast, and seemed to fall asleep, his long dark lashes feathering a curved and peerless cheek.

  His breathing rose and filled her need...

  She touched his blossom hand that had caught a minute finger through a hole in the spider’s web.

  His matchless peace invaded her.

  She knew that they were one.

  Mrs. Armstrong paid her bill, and suddenly looked round, disconcerted by the stillness of her son, asleep in the lap of a child.

  Still as milk in the shadowed churn of the closing apricot day, the simple gingham overall evoked a nursery rhyme...

  The goose-girl settled in feathers, by a barn, in the day’s half light...

  Her bare feet streaked with new cut grass,

  her arms across sleek white backs...

  Try as she might to suppress it, the image held her eye.

  She clipped her purse decisively, threw words in mock alarm,

  ‘Well it’s no use falling asleep young man. It’s time to take you home...’

  Stephanie stood, and without lifting her eyes from his face, said

  ‘There’s no need to disturb him. I’ll carry him outside.’

  Dear Reader,

  If you have enjoyed this book please consider leaving a review at your chosen retailer. Your opinion matters.

  This book is available in print (ISBN 978-0-9575002-3-5) at most online retailers.

  About The Author.

  Philippa's many lives read like fantasy fiction. Born in South Africa in 1941, fatherless before the age of two, she experienced the wildest parts of rural Africa in the care of her grandfather, on safari for weeks inspecting rural African schools with a cook, a tracker and a folding table. The other extreme was imprisonment in boarding schools studying the Metaphysical poets, Theology and the English Monarchy, and always hungry Related to Elizabeth Barrett Browning, it is perhaps not surprising that she should arrived at a poetic narrative for vivid economy and travelling light.

  The 'leitmotif' of her writing is a celebration of the individual, often eccentric, always out of the mainstream

  She has lived on (culturally) deserted islands in the Indian Ocean, fishing for supper; at the Max Planck Institute in Bavaria; lectured to mature University students; designed buildings; single handedly built her home, an arts centre and concert hall; raised four daughters, and failed to master the cello. Always reading and writing first.

  She lives in Somerset in her converted barns with an old collie and a long-suffering husband.

  She would be delighted to hear from readers through her website

  http://involution-odyssey.com/

  Connect with me on Facebook

  Follow me on Twitter

  Other Books.

  ‘Involution-An Odyssey Reconciling Science to God’ is a poetic journey through scientific thought from pre-Socratic Greece to Now. It offers a new and complementary alternative to evolution- instead Involution, the encoding of experience as memory. The history of science is the evidence of the incremental recovery of this cellular embedded memory through the contemplative inspirations of genius. Saints and Scientists break the same bread

  It was published by CollaborArt Books in 2013 and may be sampled on her website Involution-An Odyssey/ where recordings and reviews are posted. It achieved highly commended runner-up nomination for the Book of the Year (2013) by the Scientific and Medical Network and has received notable endorsements from Ervin Laszlo, Philip Franses, David Lorimer and Andrew Harvey.

  Excerpts from Reviews of Involution-An Odyssey Reconciling Science to God.

  …a book that is a rarity: it is on a controversial, actually hair-and-eyebrow-raising-subject. If you the reader are as brave as the author, you are in for a fantastic ride. Getting close to science as well as to God at the same time. That's no mean feat. Enjoy the ride and the light! (Dr Ervin Laszlo)

  A brilliant and profoundly erudite epic charting the evolution of Western thinking processes, probing the frontiers of rationality and naturalism and opening up a deeper understanding… The author's grasp of the principal elements of Western culture is masterly and her poetic narrative woven together with extraordinary subtlety. This is nothing short of a heroic intellectual tour de force and deserves the widest readership (David Lorimer)

  The very act of genius…the genius of involution is not just a mechanism of science relating to the whole but a completely different realisation of the beautiful within living process. ( Philip Franses Editor; Holistic Science Journal)

  "This is a marvellous, wise, unique work written with great flair and originality. Read it slowly and learn from it's truth".(Andrew Harvey)

  The website offers excerpts and reviews of Involution-An Odyssey as well links to all retailers and books are available in both print and EBook formats.

  Philippa’s author profile is available at Smashwords and she welcomes any contact or questions from readers and can be contacted at philipparees7(at)gmail(dot)com

  Reviews of Yucatan

  Alison Jakes (Poetry Circle)

  ‘I was utterly awestruck by the writing skill and breadth of imaginative evocation.....poetic, elegiac...almost unbearably intense...sensuous imagery from both nature and modern urban living...musical, both rhythmic and assonant...sustained dramatic tension within a simple everyday story....the superficiality of the beauty salon is a very potent metaphor....’

  Katherine Knight (Real Writers)

  The story is a vehicle for some impressive poetry. It is highly emotional and transforms the ordinary protagonist into an archetypal figure of suffering motherhood.

  ‘Speech must now grow from silence and the stones that cockle the black backs

  Of women in pre-history, left alone with the consequence of men’

  There is religious dimension too. Throughout there are subtle references to the Christian Nativity, and on another level it tells of Christ’s birth and Mary’s suffering in modern terms. It contrasts the cruelty of the girl’s Catholic mother, with the compassion of her Jewish landlady.

  There is implicit criticism of the hypocrisy of society as a whole….The poem has a social purpose.

  Alan Morrison, (Editor The Recusant)

  Philippa Rees is as an immediately distinctive and striking poet who writes with unfashionably – often brilliant – painterly verbal play and colour, oozing with a sensuous love of language. Rees’s almost tangible style dazzles with imagistic chiaroscuro; stark contrasts of light and shade, subtext and texture:

  This ripeness of verbiage and intrinsic musicality inevitably bring comparisons wit
h Dylan Thomas (particularly the densely descriptive, rumble-tumble list- passages of Under Milk Wood): But this is not to detract from Rees’s individuality, which, throughout this book of poetic narrative interspersed with colourful dialogue, is palpable and often beguiling

  I can’t help hearing Richard Burton’s silvery intoning of ‘the webfoot cocklewomen and the tidy wives’. But this is not to detract from Rees’s individuality, which, throughout this book of poetic narrative interspersed with colourful dialogue, is palpable and often beguiling. She is prone to the lingering aphorism that is imaginatively her own – ‘The cradle of compassion lies in an open palm’; ‘Nights are cloth soup silence’; ‘…alone in triptych of frescoed gilt…’ – and the unforgettable image – sometimes oblique, but still workably so:

  Lethargy, that toothless crone, skims perpetual

  indifference from the cream of richer care.

  For my part, I read A Shadow in Yucatán mainly for its poetry, its play with language, image and sound, rather than strictly trying to follow the actual narrative. Approaching this book with a sort of Negative Capability, I experienced it in terms of descriptive impression, verbal effect. In this respect, A Shadow in Yucatán is disarmingly beautiful

  Independent Reviews Self Publishing Magazine

  The back blurb calls ‘A Shadow in Yucatán’ a ‘distilled novel’ and it is –a home brew, raw and omnipotent! Rees makes extraordinary the sorrowful ordinary of an unwanted pregnancy and the resulting difficult decisions. She celebrates the sense of community, despairs of family and counts on the generosity of strangers. She explores problems and finds solutions – hard through they are to take – in unexpected places