Content note: rape/coercion references
I sit and knot my skein of thread and sing my ditty, gazing out at the surging waves. When my betrothed returns we’re to be married. He sailed one spring morning, swearing he’d return on lammasnight.
He smiled at me and I, simple lass, was overcome. But since I promised, I’ve come to know his cruelty, his lust. I didn’t want to, not before our wedding, but he snarled: stop him and he’d say I’d whored with half his crew.
And so I sit, and knot my skein, sing the waves high, the sky dark. Soon there’ll be a storm.
Tom Juniper Poetry 