The Boatman
by and published in Edition Six of Pomegranate
My first job was a baby, mewling,
tiny, sucking at the thickened lifeless air
like a mother’s breast. Useless. Then the men,
the women; some of them begged, bartered, raged –
against me, the boatman, against the river which cupped them
so maternally, curiously, licking, tasting the boat’s edge.
Against their lofty moth-eaten gods. Some would have dived,
swum forever against the pushing tide rather than join
the vast silence beyond, but
the worst ones only talked. I rowed, one-two,
one-two, to the music of their remembered lives:
the way the lightning gasped across the sky, like fingers
flashing to meet. The way two dragonflies
sparked against each other over lighter waters
than these, like children, like lovers, heavy, fumbling.
And maybe one day soon I’ll row myself, in time
to a rhythm of my own – one-two, one-two – pass the way of kings and rebels,
mothers, children, the desperate poor,
against the humming twilight notes of oars.
Rachel Rowan-Olive
Rachel Rowan-Olive is easily amused by words, and is consequently studying for AS levels in too many languages at St Albans High School for Girls. She was a commended Foyle Young Poet in 2008 and won the Amnesty International poetry competition You Can’t Jail Minds with a poem written on mirrors.