In Praise of a Woman by Olive M Ritch

In Praise of a Woman

An old uncoupled crow flies low
across the tarmac, where Lucy runs
to blue double doors with friends.
My hand still longing for her hand
in mine at the school’s iron gates.
And there’s no looking back, as if
she fears turning into a pillar of salt.
Does she know Lot’s wife’s story?

A friend whispers in her ear
and she giggles into a landscape
of places, spaces, to hide in, dream,
and become herself. A stranger
who warms my hand when we
meet, again, woman to woman.

OLIVE M RITCH

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The Featured Poem series normally carries a commentary by Into Poetry. However, the explanatory note that Olive M Ritch supplied upon the poem’s acceptance is so detailed and illuminating that we thought it should stand for itself. It is enough to add that Ritch is an Orcadian poet who has taught literature and creative writing at the University of Aberdeen, and that her debut collection, Weather Blinks, has just been published (in May 2026) by Drunk Muse Press…

In my doctoral thesis, I explored the influence of Freud on the poetry of H.D., and in my poem ‘In Praise of a Woman’ I engage with the theories of Donald Winnicott, Alice Miller and Carl Rogers in regard to considering the benefit to society of the fully integrated individual who enjoys life and does not hurt or harm others or themselves. Thus, Lucy’s mother in the poem appreciates her daughter’s need of space to grow and develop into her true self, and is able to sublimate her own feelings and needs as a mother.

I decided to use the sonnet form for this poem as I wanted not only to draw attention to its theme of love, but also to distil my knowledge of the needs of the child and the (at times) competing needs of the parent in the octave and sestet structure.

The single crow at the beginning of the poem taps into that symbol of loss and death as a means of suggesting the way in which a parent may suffer a sense of loss when, for instance, their child no longer wishes to take their hand, and that the good enough parent will always sublimate their own needs in the interests of their child.

Olive M Ritch

Weather Blinks by Olive M Ritch can be bought here.