Old stories can lift an unfamiliar mirror up to our lives so that we see ourselves anew and as we really are. Tonight, I will tell you an old story. It’s a story about a silvery day of sea fret (mist), rolling ocean waves, empty fishing nets, and a solitary herring.
Journal entry:
6th July, Wednesday
“I sit on the bank, one leg hanging down.
A drake mallard in eclipse, treads water,
with slow, lazy strokes of his feet.
He watches me.
I watch him.
We are both waiting for something...
but what?
I smile, but it means nothing to him.
He softly chuckles, but I hear only sounds and intent,
But not what that intention is.
He could be Penny - a little soul staring at each move I make.
Trying to read me, as I try to read him,
Or the sheep in the neighbouring field.
Or the horses, frozen,
on the dolphin-backed curve of the hill.
I want to tell him 'it'll be alright'.
But we both know, it isn't.
But that is the point, isn't it?
Neither of us live in a world of fairy tale endings.
We're just trying to find our ways in a crooked world.
Not so that others will follow the paths we make,
But that they may hear our songs (you, duck, and me) and
Know that they are not on their own.”
Episode Information:
In this episode I read a very short extract from Roy Vickery’s (2019) Vickery’s Folk Flora, published by Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
I also refer to Sharon Blackie’s (2019) Foxfire, Wolfskin and other stories of Shapeshifting Women, published by September Books where you can read her (much briefer) version of the story of the herring and the fisherman.
Field recording
The waves on a shingle beach was recorded by ‘ermine’ at Felixstowe (14/10/2006) and can be found here. The herring gull was recorded in Scheveningen, the Netherlands (05/10/2020) by ‘Canardo55’ and can be found here.
General Details
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For more information about Nighttime on Still Waters
You can find more information and photographs about the podcasts and life aboard the Erica on our website at noswpod.com.