Dusk on the water, the job was to watch,unracked, the wet still-dripping creels being tippedinto the grading tray, alive with life.Our seas provided black-eyed velvet crabswith small horns ridging their top plates. The work: to grade by size, Those big as a fist, they pointed – big as a heart, I saw – were lifted […]
That the fish spoke is certain.Halcro and Einar both heard it in the netAnd Gunnar, running, too.But what it said –A something of sweet sounds –No one could say.Halcro was all for keeping it,But Einar not, and Gunnar probably.The boy fingered and half cradled it,The light flashing on each scaleLike silver spilling in his arms,And […]
‘Jump Into Air’ is a poem by Guinevere Glasfurd on the subject of the decline of the British fishing industry.
Each time I called for him he was perfectly ready,equipment checked and in smooth order,pared to essentials. And I, cluttered with gadgets,would clatter behind as he led the way downstairs. In the boat, as befits a sedulous angler,he was taciturn, though between essential wordshe would give that courteous, gentle smilethat was his signature, before his […]
Box work
Way down in the warm blue crevasse
of night its fishing commences
On that sinuous passage from infancy
/ and youth’s buoyancy through middle
/ life to advanced years, the one certainty
/ is a…
Nineteen fifty six was a momentous year,
/ The year of Suez…
They are fermin the fower winds:
/ Five grey- stemmed daffodils
/ on the hill abuin Eynhallow
/ that whirlmagig air intil pouer.
/
/ Aa Simmerdim on Flotta…
(The Dark Side)
/
/ My mind goes back to Fumin Wood, and how we stuck it out,
/ Eight days of hunger, thirst and…
The blood / of the fish / becoming / the blood / of the bear.
I went out to the hazel wood, / Because a fire was in my head, / And cut and peeled…
