‘A Stone’s Throw’
POETRY IS a beautiful thing made up of words which create sound and mood and feeling. Poetry is often what comes out of the heart, the mind and the soul, and it belongs to all of us. It can be sad, happy, romantic; it can be about war, death, peace, love, the past, the present or the future. It can make you laugh or cry; it can make you sing. So many poems are set to music; so many poems are used to comfort, to warm the heart, to share deep feelings. That being said, we will now turn our attention to another poem and, as you can see, this one, like the first one we did, also has a Christian background.
A STONE’S THROW
We shouted out, We’ve got her! Here she is! It’s her all right.
We caught her.
There she was.
A decent-looking woman, you’d have said, (They often are).
Beautiful but dead scared,
Tousled we roughed her up.
A little, nothing much.
And not the first time, By any means. She’d felt men’s hands, Greedy over her body. But ours were virtuous, Of course.
And if our fingers bruised her, Her shuddering skin.
There were love-bites, compared, To the hail of kisses of stone.
The last assault, And battery, frigid rape. To come,
Of right.
For justice must be done, Specially when.
It tastes so good.
And then - this guru,
Preacher, God merchant God-knows-what. Spoilt the whole thing,
Speaking to her. Should never speak to them, Squatting on the ground – her level. Writing in the dust, Something we couldn’t read.
And saw in her, Something we couldn’t see. At least until,
He turned his eyes on us. Her eyes on us,
Our eyes upon our selves.
We walked away, Still holding our stones. That we may throw, Another day. Given the urge. – by Elma Mitchell
Please read this poem as many times as you find it necessary to get an understanding of it. Do find out the meanings of any unfamiliar words after your first reading.
This poem, based on an incident recorded in St John, in the Bible, tells of a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery and taken to Jesus for him to make a judgement. It is told from the perspective of her accusers, who seem gleeful to have effected a capture and all that it entails. Though not a long poem, the narrator builds up the suspense with descriptions and self-righteous claims and assertions. Pity for the woman’s situation or concern for her soul are totally lacking, but I am getting ahead of myself; so now, let us look at each stanza together.
Come with me through the verses. In verse one, the scene is one of a group of persons that is loudly proclaiming that they have got hold of someone. Obviously, they intend to draw attention to the woman of whom they have hold. They clearly want to make a spectacle of her. With the line: “It’s her all right”, the idea that there may be some doubt that this is the guilty party, especially when they have brought no partner to the ‘crime’. On the other hand, this could be a shout to confirm certainty. One could even go as far as to say that maybe they had tried to catch her in the act before and had only succeeded at this point in time. The verse ends with a particular device. What is it, and why is it used here?
Stanza two is used to give us a picture of the captive. The speaker gives his opinion that it is the usual thing for decent-looking women to engage in adultery. He goes a bit further when he tells us that she is beautiful but very frightened (as anyone would have been). Then, as if it was of no consequence, adds that her hair was untidy because they had roughed her up a bit. Can you identify the tone here?
Again, this stanza is linked to the third one. The self-righteousness of the speaker emerges very clearly now as he states that this woman was accustomed to being pawed by men. In saying this, he is telling us that she was a prostitute or a very immoral woman. Notice how he justifies their action, or tries to do so, in having had their hands all over her by saying “But ours were virtuous, Of course.”
Sheer hypocrisy! There would have been no need for them to have had their hands all over her! But his idea is that they who have brought her in to be judged and sentenced are better than she is. What do you think? As we move on, it becomes clear that the men had not been gentle with her. In fact, the speaker sees no reason why they should be, since, in his mind, she was going to be stoned to death anyway. What do you think of the following stanza? In it, the persona refers to the death by stoning, which he expects to take place as “the last assault” and “frigid rape”. I am sure you know the meaning of the word ‘assault’; so are we being told that this group of men has physically attacked the woman, or is it being said that others have previously attacked her? Suffice it to say that he sees what is to come as a type of rape, this time not the forcibly taking of sexual favours, but of a life.
We will take a break here now and return to this poem in our next ‘class’. You are preparing to take your place in a world which needs you, so prepare well. God bless!