It’s more than Larkin’ about
Twice in one week sweet peas arrive
Clutched in smiling hands, precious gifts
Two wondrous women, one supports God
The other requiring scientific explanation
Bring flowers to my door
An old fool dismisses such trinkets while
His soul smiles as the bounteous perfume
Wafting at dreams that cannot be realised
So the restless spirit moves on
Is that too much to give?
We travel through time towards decay
Days slip by without notice
As new life replaces old
Fresh energy springing from the womb
Does yesterday need to live?
Indubitably for it provides energy
For all our tomorrows
And, as the scientist will say
Energy never dies
What will god say to that?
copyright 2005 Trevor Lockwood
Shall I?
Shall I live alone when I grow old
Sat in an armchair as I scowl in the cold
At a world changed beyond recognition
And yearn for days when I was bright and alert
And the pain in my heart did not hurt?
I’ll panic and moan as I sit on the throne
Picking at scabs of the cuts wishing I’d had the guts
To let the world love and not drone
On about the times I have known
That seem to have flown
Or will a new world bring purpose and zest
Not knowing what to choose for the best
As old bones rush through on a crest
Full of magical games to play?
I’ll have some of that if I may
There’ll be time for cooked breakfast every day
Not having to care what I weigh
Plenty of time to waste
Thinking of jobs not to my taste
No worry about being replaced
Reading books that will teach me to play
New games that lead grandchildren astray
We shall skip to the beach
Just as mum starts to preach
We’ll laugh as we scamper away
Time for childhood again
Perhaps I’ll jump on a plane
To lands faraway on a dream
There I’ll listen to voices
That tell me of choices
Copyright 2005 Trevor Lockwood
Hemlock by Joyce Dore, ISBN 1898030871 (obtainable from all good bookshops) looks at the life of Boudica (Boudicca, Boadicea) Queen of the Iceni, an East Anglian tribe in England at the time of the Roman occupation. Popular myth suggests that she was given to the Druids, to be executed. This book suggests otherwise.
Chapter 4
Slowly, as the encounter proceeded, Victoria felt uninhibited as she was enfolded in an embrace by the spectre and became part of this demented entity. She was being invited to experience something it was trying to convey to her. The anticipation of the unknown, coursed through her veins like molten lead. A chance like this came only once in a lifetime, if then, and this opportunity was not to be wasted on nervous dithering. Resolve bit like a hunting terrier with its teeth sunk deep into a rat. It would not let go until it had been appeased.
Suddenly she was no longer on a deserted road in the middle of the Fens. Instead Victoria found herself in a clearing in the middle of a dark wood. Only the stars gave light to many people who were gathered.
Looking about, she wondered why no campfires had been lit. Then Victoria picked up on the fear permeating the atmosphere. She realised that these people were desperate fugitives, hiding from something or someone.
The flicker of flames would have beckoned anyone searching for them, and the telltale sweet smell of the wood smoke drifting on the night air would surely have led anyone to the fire from whence it came. No smoke without fire was certainly a true axiom.
People lay slumped and weary in twos and threes, their heads resting anywhere there was something to act as a cushion. Some had their heads on the laps of a comrade, others on a mossy knoll. Their exhaustion was complete. The dell was as silent as the grave. No word was uttered, and no sound broke the stillness of the night. Heavy earth scents mingled with the sweat of terror, hung motionless in the gloom.
Victoria became aware of a woman propped up against the bole of a vast, gnarled oak. She was trying to comfort a slim, fair-haired, young girl who was trembling in her arms.
Abruptly the quiet of the forest was shattered! Everyone leapt to their feet, swords in hand. The fugitives were ambushed and out numbered by dozens of screaming soldiers.
The fearsome warriors appeared to be dressed in dark kilts and held bronze shields that echoed with the sound of a death sentence as they rattled their spears and swords against them. The wearied party had come to their feet painfully and attempted to fight back bravely, but their fatigue let them down and they were easily quelled.
Some of the uniformed soldiers ignited rush lights, giving the scene an unearthly ambience. Distorted, inky black shadows of the fighters danced and bounced from the gigantic tree trunks like mad cavorting demons. Screams of anguish echoed and reverberated from the massive oaks as the wounded and dying were brutally slaughtered.
Never had Victoria seen and heard of such a conflict between even the most hated of enemies. As it was splashed over the clearing like a charnel house, the smell of blood made her feel sick. She felt as if her bones would melt. She was certain that this battle had taken place centuries before and all that she was seeing was a replay especially for her benefit, displayed by the ghost who was her mentor.
Victoria realised that the woman who had met her, was in fact her guide and now she had taken her place in the tableau. She glanced up hastily to where two men stood apart from the fray. One was a Roman general. The other was dressed in the Roman fashion of white toga and cloak, his face partially hidden in the darkness. In the gloom the woman had managed to discern the features of a face that she had once adored. It was Julius, Julius Classicus!
Now Victoria realised that her guide and mentor was sharing her thoughts, her feelings and her life when she had been alive at this time. She felt the woman’s heart sink, knowing now that it was Julius, her lover, who had betrayed them to the enemy. She tried to scream, “Traitor!” but a swift blow to the back of her head from the hilt of a soldier’s sword, sent her to her knees making her dizzy and see flashing lights. Still she struggled to her feet from the mossy ground, and flew at the opponent who had attacked her.
Then the girl, whom the woman had been nursing, was now defending her back, but the child too was brutally punched to the ground by a man whose fists were covered with gore. His snarling face was a mask of bestiality as he drooled at the prospect of destroying such a beautiful young girl, and his intentions became obvious when he raised his kilt. He threw the child to the ground and fell upon her.
Gradually the clamour of the conflict was stilled. Dragged by her hair, the woman was brought to where the Governor General of the Roman army, Suetonius Paulinus stood alone. His treacherous companion had slunk quietly off into the dense woods, taking the path that ran beside the waterfall and stream.
Suetonius had travelled by forced march for days, not sparing man or beast. Word had reached him in the western regions of Anglesey in Mona, of an enlightened school of learning. Nero had commanded him to destroy all evidence of it considering it a hot bed of insurrection, teaching young people to think and ask questions. The commanders sent to repel the Iceni uprising had refused. They were mortally afraid of her and her rag-tag army of common serfs and their families.
Suetonius had found very little to compensate for the long trek across the hills and dales of Britain when he had stormed the great stone buildings, sacred to the Druids as their halls of law and wisdom.
Most of the inhabitants had escaped by sea in the tiny coracles to a large green island. All their knowledge was stored in their heads. They were known never to write anything down. Everything had to be learned and remembered in the twenty years of an acolyte’s tuition. To make certain that their minds did not wander away from their lessons, the young people were not allowed to journey home in all of that time.
Suetonius decapitated every Druid who could be caught, be they young acolytes or old tutors. Their heads were pierced by long wooden pikes and placed for all to see, around the wrecked walls of the gracious buildings.
Those who had escaped by paddling their hide and wattle coracles as fast as they could on the out going tide, were washed up against the shores of their new island home, their fortunes and future, unknown.
Suetonius, insane with anger at the deceit of the falsehood, glared at the two women, his bloodshot eyes rimmed with the grit and mud of sleepless nights. “My orders are to take you alive if possible. If not, I am to take your head as evidence of your death and those of your daughters to my lord Nero.” Then he looked at the rest of his captives. “Finish the men off,” he barked. “The women you can use, but be quick about it, and I want these two out of the area before dawn. And take careful note of this.” Suetonius had lowered his voice and those men who had served with him for some years, knew that he was ramming home a message that they dare not forget. “ I want these two women guarded with your lives. If they escape, then those responsible will be crucified, gutted and then used for target practice. Do you understand?” He waited while they absorbed this order, and then continued, “Any Druid or their supporter found anywhere near them, are to have their tongues cut out and their heads mounted on a pole like those at their precious house of learning. Then he nodded his head, indicating he had finished giving his commands.
Still dazed from the blow that she had received from the sword hilt, the woman staggered to her feet. “How brave the Roman General is with women and children,” she mocked him.
“Any other woman and child, yes, but not with you my Lady Queen Boudica. All Rome knows what murderous havoc you have caused in Britain, and Nero has been asked questions in the Senate as to what he intends to do with you when captured,” Suetonius replied. Spittle from his cruel mouth sprayed everyone who was within an arm’s reach.
“Nero plans to display you in the arena as the main attraction,” he taunted, an ugly grimace displaying his rotten uneven teeth, and then looked about, his eyes searching the shadows. “I was told that you had two daughters. Where is the other?”
The furious sparks of pure hatred in her eyes should have warned Suetonius of the danger that he was in. Boudica was onto him with her teeth bared and the claws on her hands, aimed at his throat. “Your brave men took turns raping them when my oldest daughter, Cavatina, and her young sister, Ceridwen, were playing in a stream. Those men stole my children’s gold torques as they assaulted them, so they knew that they were violating princesses.” She was shaking him by his shoulders as if he were a weak aspen leaf fluttering in the wind, Suetonius was held helpless by Boudica’s iron grip, unable to free himself from her maternal rage that held all watching, in deep thrall.
Boudica’s face was distorted. Her teeth exposed like a wild animal and her eyes flattened into slits of sheer loathing, as a savage howl of rage escaped her. “Ceridwen brought her older sister, Cavatina, home demented. I sent Cavatina to be healed by some friendly priests. She is still with them. Go and find her if you still have the courage!” she screamed at him.
