Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

   Three weeks into marriage, and Thelma felt nothing but revulsion for her husband. She scarcely felt she could live in the same world as him - never mind share the same house - and the same bed. Yet there she lay. The touch of his thigh against hers was repulsive: the faint odour of his body was repulsive. And yet there she was. It was as if the darkness imprisoned - held her down. Thoughts raced round in her sleepless brain - she tried to silence them, but they raced all the faster. And through her weary insomnia the bell of the village church chimed the hours - one o’clock; two o’clock; three o’clock; four o’clock.

   At the sound of five o’clock she could bear it no longer. Thelma got up and dressed as quietly as possible. Then she went downstairs, opened the front door, went out, and closed it quietly behind her. It was April, and the grey dawn was already lighting up the sky. She could make out clearly the flowers in the garden, the nearby houses, the trees and the tall spire of the village church. Birds sang from the branches. At other times she would have identified them. Not now. All that Thelma heard was a vague twitter of happiness she could not enter into.

   She walked along the lane towards the village church, and then leant over the churchyard wall. Even in the dim light she could see the graveyard quite clearly. There were the cared-for graves, with daffodils and forget-me-nots in bloom. There were the semi-cared-for graves, the grass cleared away, but otherwise quite bare. And there were the totally neglected graves. She knew that most of the inscriptions were unreadable even in the brightness of daylight. And around them grew nothing but weeds.

   One day all this suffering would be over.