They don’t know what is coming

for the women of North Berwick 1589

 

Their tongues are behind their teeth.

Their thoughts are not elaborate.

Evening has come and they are in their gardens.

 

One is pulling carrots

Another stands between her arms

And still another adjusts her waistband.

 

They are in the ordinary evening

The way a cup is under a tap,

To catch ordinary water.

 

It feels good to be free of the house

Now that the storm has passed.

 

The women are in their gardens.

The women are in their gardens.

The women are in their gardens

 

And evening is a weightless place

Where anything can happen.

 

A three-days moon

Nicks the sky.

 

Lynn Davidson

Writer Lynn Davidson, after living in Edinburgh for the past four years, has returned home to New Zealand. Her latest poetry collection Islander is published by Shearsman Books in the UK and Victoria University Press in New Zealand. She had a Hawthornden Fellowship in 2013 and a Bothy Project Residency at Inshriach Bothy in the Cairngorms in 2016. Lynn has a doctorate in creative writing, teaches creative writing, and is a member of 12, an Edinburgh-based feminist poetry collective. Her website