“Who you is?”
No stranger could enter the village
and get past Miss Lewis.
“Where you come from?
Who you belong to? The Brathwaites
from Kendal? The Holligans
from Woodland? Jane Batson
dat move from Four Roads to Cherry Grove?”
Miss Lewis always claimed to be familiar
with some branch from everybody family tree,
as if her knowledge gave the right of passage
to strangers coming through.
Not even death dodged past her
one particular night. From dusk
the dogs was howling and they howl
the whole night long, as if they seeing
something strange. Before day break
Miss Lewis knocking at the neighbour
door, “Get dat boy to a doctor quick;
I see Ma vigilant ’bout dis place last night.”
The mother obeyed and her sick child lived.
One time Pearl Johnson, tired of her husband’s
beatings, plucked up courage and laid
the villain low with a piece of iron.
It was Miss Lewis who seized the evidence
and kept it hidden, “Dis don’t need no law
getting into it. Everyt’ing done settle.”
Ol’ Johnson lived but never hit his wife again.
Tonight I hear the dogs howling constantly;
Is it you, long buried, walking through the city?
Have you come to remind us who we are?
Will you cover our trespasses?
Are you saying not every death
is necessary if only we would listen?
And why have the dogs gone silent now?
©Esther Phillips
MISS LEWIS WAS A NEIGHBOUR who lived next to us when we were growing up and she was like family. She was a petite woman who loved her pinch of snuff. I can still see her balancing a bucket of water on her head or cooking on a small wood fire outside her tiny house.
I can see her sitting in our “shed-roof” at night telling stories about devilish deeds done at four-crossroads or the higue who lost her powers when she failed to count all the rice grains placed on the steps, before sunrise.
Miss Lewis had piercing eyes; nothing missed her, and indeed the poem above depicts her as the village-keeper, self-appointed though she was. I remember wondering why she asked all these questions and I was always surprised that people actually supplied her with the answers.
But the idea of the gatekeeper is nothing new. Societies have always recognized the need and created the means to protect themselves from unwanted intrusion of whatever kind.
Do we need more village-keepers these days? Sociologists describe the modern society as “individualistic”, a term we now use to explain our selfishness and lack of concern for others. But will there ever be a time that we do not need to be our brother’s keeper? And can we deal with the fallout from the resulting alienation that many, especially the young, are experiencing?
The poem above also addresses the question of myth or folklore. Recognized as perhaps the greatest researcher and scholar on the subject of mythologies around the world, Joseph Campbell defines myth as offering “clues to the spiritual potentialities of human life”.
Some of us still remember when the constant cooing of doves meant that some neighbour was about to die. Dogs howling persistently at night signalled that some spirit was around with a warning. Of course, we now dismiss all this as mere superstition or foolishness. But at least this marked a time when communities were bonded by common cultural beliefs, and people still looked to nature for insight and guidance.
I am of the view that we simply trade one kind of belief system for another. Materialism is the new mythology and with its emphasis comes the death of the values we have held dear and which we need for survival and true progress.
But all is not lost if the village-keepers in our present society come forward and take their places as a matter of urgency.
Why do you think the dogs have gone silent now?
• Esther Phillips is head of the Division of Liberal Arts of the Barbados Community College. She is also a poet and editor of BIM: Arts For The 21st Century. Email eephillips7@hotmail.com