“They are also portrayed [in art] on, or by, bridges, so explicit did the imaginative link seem [to Victorians] between the ‘fallen’ woman and her possible literal ‘fall’ thereafter as she jumps into the water to commit suicide.”
‘The Fallen Woman’ exhibition notes, Foundling Museum 2016
Flounder
Barely a shock to the cocky mud-larks raking
the river-shore for spoils. Here is a ha’penny,
here a brooch, a snapped stem of gentleman’s
pipe, carved bone clagged with clay, but still
worth the pocketing. The Thames is a pickler,
preserving the city’s detritus in its own juices,
a broth of the unwanted. And here she is, fish
out of water flopped on the fore-shore, silver
skinned and belly up, a twist of saturated skirts
making a mermaid’s tail. Hardly Ophelia, no
weedy bouquets clasped in her un-ringed left
hand, the luxury of grand gestures beyond her
grasp. A proscenium sweep of bridge keeps
her obscenity from offending a god who’d
never heard of her. There is no baptism found
in these waters. No forgiveness gleaned in the
soupy tide. Only limbs, limp; the dampness
of new death: and the river’s uncleansed bride.
Published in The Fenland Reed, issue 3, Autumn 2016
© Sarah Doyle