Washer-women [Fenway]

by Aileen Ma

inspired by

Jean Francois Millet, “The Washerwomen”, c. 1848


In this village where we have lived for years thus far, our lives revolve around the water, and it takes us in, even as we are part of it. We have lived here all our lives, and learnt the lesson handed down to us, that one day, we will hand down as well. Washing our clothes, backs hunched over the side of the lake, we are part of the cold cold water as we move our hands up and down, up and down, like the hands of our husbands also. We have not seen them, our husbands, for it has been many seasons since they went away—only, we remember. Like pictures in our head, we remember the days when they came to take our husbands away, by force that we tried to, but could not fight. Even so, we all feel it, and we see it in our minds, so we know that this is true. We sometimes hear strains of the songs they sing to make the heavy loads easier to bear. They are melancholy like heaving, for they are too weary to shout. Usually it is the wind, and we know this. But still, we sing our replies to them, weaving the same melody back, mixing the sadness with hope, telling ourselves that this is to bring them hope, when we really all know that we need the hope too.

Where we live, there is wild beauty of the forest and water. The lake and the sea are almost one, and the saltiness is divided by a strip of land. We want both to be one, but know we could not live, if so, and so we cry to make up for the lack of salt. Our husbands, rowing the boat of a prince they do not know, but are taught to fear, are going through the same motions as us, only back and forth, their arms move forward and then backwards. Sometimes there is the pulling with their bodies, making music that jangle like keys, maybe, chains, of a dark melody. We know this by the way that our people, our women, have known these things. The bustling of village life, tamed life is still here. Here too, with us, are the voices of children, our children, laughing aloud for secret reasons, sometimes crying for the same. But beside the sheep, the foals, the chickens—our animals and our young, the hearty chuckles of our husbands are scarcely heard anymore, except in our minds. Soon, our sons will grow up to replace the hearty laughs with their own, but it will not be the same. They will grow up to work the fields like men—but still, it will not be the same. The textured, muscular, and hairy arms and chest that once held so tight they were a part of us, are so far away now that they have left hollowness where we wish for, maybe, scars, or anything, if only a mark to remember the having once had.

But though our husbands are gone, we still have laundry to do. We cannot drop everything and sit, waiting, though we want to. And so we are clutching our washing stones and laundry, holding on and throwing down by the lake which is so much like the sea. We are holding onto the stones like they are so much more. The water is eating away at our hands, weathering us away to the bone, chilling and calming us in a strange way all the same. We do not know much, but to carry through each day and to hope—for something.

I know that I shall remain, changed, but unchanged.

(previously appearing in the January archives)