The Albany Poetry Workshop

Forum I: Improbable Tales


Cheryl L. Higgins



The Moor-lands Witch

Each bore a burning branch of beech
In silence towards the moor
and knocked while nodding, each to each
On Widow Liston's door.

As Lady Liston looked alarmed
(And would not let them in),
They called out "Coo, we'll not ye harm
Tho' sinner you have been"

So, looked she long through lowered lash
At men who, wary, stood;
Un-tied her trailing apron sash
And let slip back her hood.

A hot and hearty head of hair
Around her face did fall.
She toyed with tendrils (most unfair)
Then on the moon did call.

"They wish a widow was a witch
And so shall bear that shame.
Let thoughtless thinking to them hitch!
Like sheep! They're all the same!"

No more than musing mention made
Before her oaken door -
She gaped and gasped, for thirty sheep
Were headed 'cross the moor!

November, 1998

Cheryl L. Higgins's questions:

Here is "The Moor-lands Witch", about a woman who surprises herself with her own power. Rather than "grisley", maybe its lighter and a bit fun.

In this poem, I have attempted some alliteration, repeating a pattern in the first and third lines, which can be picked up in the first stanza. My question in order to keep to the pattern, I have used archaic phrasing. Does it all work, and can the story be followed?

Oh, I used the name of "Janet Liston", who was one of those accused of witchcraft in Ireland at the last trial for witches there, in around 1711. She and 4 other Janets, along with three others, not so wittily named, are the subjects of a slow-coming short story I began called "The Pillory of Cerrik-Fergus". Janet Liston was not, in real life, a "Lady", but I needed her to be so, here, so I could alliterate alot.