A Bit of Prose

I used to dabble in the odd bit of poetry way back in the early 90s, so please excuse me dear reader if my alliteration is illiterate and my punctuation is not punctual.

The man stood alone, not knowing that what he looked at was going to be a lasting and constant reminder of what he had lost. The empty sails were set dark against the steel blue bright sky, and the slight breeze gently ruffled the bulrushes that stood by the slow small river. The aroma of wild garlic was strong and almost overpowering, the only sound he could hear was a skylark, singing its song high above the fields.

He had told her a story of this place once upon a time, a story of love, a drowning and the ghost that remained as a warning to the easily fooled and easily led. A small dark window, set high above, watched as he crossed the stony track and walked down towards the stream that fed the pump mill. Many long summers and many harsh winters had passed since the sails had turned, and in turn had fed the fields which were once full and ripe with golden wheat. When they had first met, the mill had been freshly whitewashed, bright enough to be seen for miles, a waypoint for the unremarkable people that passed below it. When they had both walked beneath its long canvas clad limbs that sang in the freshening wind, they had both held each other and laughed at everything.

He had joked a long time ago, He had leant close to her and told her in hushed tones, of the face at the window. A white face with downturned mouth and dark smudges for eyes. He had laughed when she screamed and giggled, and continued to tell her of the face, forever looking out for his lost love. This was the man he had said, that had taken his own life. As he cried, he had lined his pockets with stone after heavy stone and had walked into the millpond. They found his body four days later, bloated and snow white. Tendrils of mares tail were caught in his hair and the waterlogged remains of a long letter were still clutched tight in his left hand. And the bright white mill continued its turning as they pulled him up the bank.

The mill was dark now, the skeletal remains of its once busy timbers sagging and blackened. No longer bright, it still stood guarding the river. The skylark had flown to sing its song elsewhere and there was no face at the window as he turned and walked away up the steep track towards home.