A Woman of Her Times, Part I
She was born as Holly Clarkson
in the year 1993,
and for most of her early days
she lived life uneventfully.
She grew up outside of London,
went to uni and married well,
had her first kid at twenty-six,
you would not think there’s much to tell.
Then her family moved to Sheffield,
by the Peak District they settled down,
all was fine until one weekend,
on an outing in a small town.
Her husband was with their daughter,
she stopped off to see an old church,
left in ruins by King Henry,
such things had always spoke to her.
She took time to imagine,
run fingers over old stone,
loved that these ancient echoes were
just a few miles from her home…
Holly closed her eyes in wonder,
but when she opened them again,
she found the church was quite intact,
and she was surrounded by robed men.
In shock, Holly took off running,
and found herself in a dirt street,
saw men dressed in thick, woolen hosen,
horses with steel shoes on their feet.
They look at her, quite astonished,
and just shrugged when she tried to talk,
her words they could not understand,
in panic, she began to walk.
She barely recognized the land,
too few houses, so many trees…
just huts of wood and rough-cut stone,
no sign of electricity.
In panic she went for hours,
no sign of her family or kin,
until she collapsed in the rain,
and a lone farmer took her in.
She awoke in a small farmstead,
to a face she didn’t recognize,
she freaked at first, and only stopped
at the kindness seen in his eyes.
When he spoke she could understand
maybe just one word out of three,
but after time she figured out
it was the year 1190.
At first she didn’t believe it,
how could a soul travel through time?
How would these people believe it
when it seemed shocking to her mind?
The young farmer couldn’t help her,
be believed her a foreign girl,
and gave her a place she could sleep
until she got back to her world.
Many times she went to that church,
touched the stones the way she once had,
but nothing worked and she realized
thing were looking increasingly bad.
Months went by and nothing happened,
she was trapped in the past, she feared,
alone, with no was to survive,
for her lost life she shed a tear.
But the reality was what it was,
she had too see the here and now,
so she married the young farmer,
though his family objected loud.
You see she was twenty-eight years,
rather old for back in that time,
but when she fell pregnant soon after
the objections seemed to subside...
CONTINUES IN PART II.
Copyright ©
David Welch
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