Labouring and Resting
The V shaped formations in the air of wild geese returning to winter in the isles are black skeins in the sky. The air is filled with the familiar cries of the geese as they call to each other through the cold air, encouraging each other to keep up, maintain their place in the squad, or signal a change of leadership, as the leader falls back to rest in the slip stream of his family's wing beats, while another comes forward to take his place, battling through the air. They ride the wind magnificent distances, returning to their wintering and breeding grounds. This little extract combines the sounds of the wing beats, haunting music and words in the soft accents of the isles.
But - an exhausted skein of geese falls on a field and eats it down to the brown earth. Farmers wage war attempting to protect their tender young crops. Local hunters go out for a day's shooting in the cold. The Brig Larder, a delicatessan in Kirkwall, sells wild goose breasts and can supply by post. Do not be tempted to saute them. These birds fly a lot. They need long, slow cooking.
Or you could just look up and wonder at these socialists of the air.
mr ishmael: I live in the country and on the shore; I see roadkill everyday,
rabbits, hares, hedehogs, low-flying gulls, raptors circle the garden,
every night I hear cries of terror as beast preys upon beast; in the
summer the fields are grazed by pretty, curious cows, being fattened for
the kill, sometimes the Eyeties arrive in parties, to shoot the geese,
for fun; a shoreside graveyard lies en route to town, the
mini-excavator or the hearse or the flower-laying relative mock the
living, as we drive past, Mr Death and his sergeants are hard to avoid,
here at World's End......
We've had some bright, cold days this last couple of weeks and Harris and I drove north-west during the Christmas break to visit the Brough of Birsay. Brough means fort and the Old Norse name is Byrgisey, which means fort island. So the whole thing means Fort Fort Island. They really meant it - about being a fort, that is.The suffix -ey or -ay means island, as in Stronsay, South Ronaldsay, Westray. Or even Orkney, although, strictly speaking, its name is Orkney Mainland - denoting how vast it is, sitting there in the middle of its archipelago of drowned mountain-tops, measuring 50 miles from northeast to southwest and 29 miles from east to west, not counting the linked south isles. They are linked by the Churchill Causeways, a fairly perilous road topping the concrete barriers constructed by Italian prisoners of war to keep the German U-boats out of the Scapa anchorage, after the Royal Oak was torpedoed on the 14th October 1939, with a loss of 835 lives,.by German decorated war hero, Gunther Prien.
 |
| Gunther Prien |
I digress. The Brough is an uninhabited tidal island, separated by the 240 metre Sound of Birsay and accessible by foot only at low tide by a largely natural causeway.
A very defensible position: an almost-island off an island off the north coast of Scotland. There was a 6th century Christian settlement there, a Pictish settlement in the 7th and 8th centuries, evidenced by a Pictish graveyard, artifacts and a carved stone. The Vikings saw them off by the 9th century and there are extensive remains of an excavated Norse settlement and a 12th century church and small monastery, built on the remains of an earlier Pictish church, and it was a place of pilgrimage until the Middle Ages. The energy at Birsay is phenomenal: positive ions abound created by the confluence of waters as they crash around the Brough.
Harris enjoyed himself, shouting at nesting seagulls, who shouted back, one dive-bombing him
 | ||||
| Aaaw- he's wearing his Christmas jumper |
Many years ago, mr ishmael and I took visiting friends over to the Brough. Let him tell the story:
There's a tiny, holy island a few miles
from me; like Lindisfarne, it is Christian, seventh or eighth century
and approached by a tidal causeway.
It looks tranquil but this is where the
North Atlantic fetches up; in summer the energy, the ions boom off the
ocean, frazzling your brains in the nicest possible way; in winter it
is the Devil's maelstrom.
I am sure these few stones are neatened,
homogenised by the tourist people but even so, fourteen, fifteen
hundred years ago, humans like us chose to live and worship in this
Godforsaken place, probably didn't have an i-thing between them, hard
not to feel a bit feely, when you visit.
A few years ago, one summer's afternoon I
was just sittting on Birsay with my friend Dick, enjoying the light and
the Atlantic breeze. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a minibus,
across the causeway, on the mainland, disgorging a dozen or so people
and them walking across the causeway to what we call the brough. A few
minutes later, in the chapel ruins, one of them started singing a
strange song, in a strange tongue.
Fuck me, I thought, looking at Dick, the
loony on the 'bus, even here there's one, I think we both felt a
mixture of species' embarrassment and irritation but within seconds the
whole dozen minibussers had joined-in. I had never heard anything even
remotely like this song, these harmonies, they were perfect but alien.
I scanned a lifetime's musicological data banks - nothing; it was
hair on the back of the neck stuff and after a few minutes it was over,
the ensemble drifting back to the minibus and away.
Later I phoned the tour operators who
ran the 'bus. They're from Georgia, y'know, back in the USSR and
they're singing the sacred sites. Sacred sites of where? Everywhere.
Where everywhere? Everywhere in the world. They're probably still at
it, on a magical, mystery tour.
I think as far as I have travelled along
that route is to visit most of the English cathedrals, old and new and
a lot of the henges. There's more such here, where I live, than
anywhere else; rings of stones, chambered cairns, ancient causeways,
they're still finding them, finding an ancient, incredible knowledge of
astronomy interwoven with Leylinery and with murderous, shamanistic
powerplay. Don't know that I'd take my guitar to them and sing Hey, Mr
Tambourine Man but who knows.
.................................................................
The contest to disentangle Scottish Independence propaganda from Farewell (Parts 1,2 and 3) by The Scots Makar, Jackie Kay, is now closed. Many thanks to the contestants who did a sterling job of attempting to unpick the seething pro-independence tangle. All have won and all must have prizes - so step up, mr verge and mr bungalow bill and let us know which topic you would like to see featured in forthcoming editions of Call Me Ishmael.
 |
| Nickie and Jackie |
Such a shame.
.....................................................
If you would like to read more from stanislav and mr ishmael, the anthology of their essays is available from lulu.com. and it is now listed by both Blackwells and the Book Depository.
please
register an account with Lulu first. This will save you a couple of
quid, as going straight into the links provided below seems to make
paypal think it's ok to charge in dollars, and apply their own
conversion rate, which will put the price up slightly for a UK buyer.
Once the new account is set up, follow one of the links (to either
paperback or hardback) or type "Honest, Not Invent" into the Lulu
Bookstore search box. If you follow a link, a pop-up box asks for age
confirmation - simply set the date to (say) 1 January 1960, and
proceed. If you type the title, the anthology will not appear as a
search result until the "show explicit content" box (found at the bottom
left by scrolling down) has been checked. You may also see the age
verification box, as above, at this point.
Honest, Not Invent is available in paperback or hardback.Link for Hard Back :
Link for Paper Back :
There's a 15% discount for a couple of days: with the voucher code = TREAT15 in
the coupon box, which takes 15% off the price before
postage. If this code has expired by the time you reach this point, try
a google search for "Lulu.com voucher code" and see what comes up.
29 comments:
You are far too kind in my case, Mrs I, since I now note that I merely echoed Mr V in my first offering and then needed to cheat in my second (though I admitted to that). Dying neurons, of course.
I like prizes, even so, and will not be graciously stepping aside. I used to enjoy pieces by Mr I where he talked about craft and physical skill; there was one where he lauded a writer about furniture-making, whose name, to my shame, I cannot recall. I don't think it appears in HNI (but it may do, those neurons again). You have your own crafts.
If not something along that line, then I just love to see stuff about where you are. This one is an example. Unimaginative, I suppose, but I find it bracing. I've always liked George Mackay Brown (I know Mr I could take him or leave him) so that probably has something to do with it. Anyway, as you choose.
That Gunther Prien was a very, very tough man.
I wonder if it was Thomas Moser, mr bb? mr ishmael admired his books and often quoted him. I'll have a delve into the archive and see what emerges. Actually, mr ishmael liked some George Mackay Brown - it was the sycophantic adulation that turned his stomach. And I'm happy to give you the occasional Orkney travel piece - I've lived here for 20 years and have to remind myself that people travel from all over the world to see what I take for granted.
Gunther Prien was tough, brave and effective. A lesson, should we have needed it, that history is written by the victors and that a man can be both a hero and a war criminal - depending on which side you are on.
Congratulations on winning the contest, together with mr verge. Wonder what he will choose.
A few months ago I was up the allotment when them there Geese were heading South. Begeezus…thousands of em. Just had a quick glance up as the first wave went over. Then 5 minutes later, another wave, then another.
I don’t recall ever seeing so many. I wondered if they make their way down the west coast only or if there are even more of them going overland and on the East coast.
Certainly seem to be thriving anyway. Have to say..wasn’t too impressed with the formation. They were all over the place. I wonder if the calling is to keep the youngsters in the V.
Yes, it is - the youngsters have to learn how to keep their places in order to minimise the wind resistance, and the calling encourages them to keep together in their family group and not wander off or let the formation become so ragged that they get blown off course. Another of evolution's miracles, mr shoulders. I saw a massive V formation this afternoon - I think they were returning to their roosting places after the day's foraging. Very cold today up here in the North, and I was returning home after a picnic with a couple of friends, looking out over sea and hills. Only just beginning to warm up now. Two jumpers and a snood on and I've lit the fire.
It's OK for you, mrs i, but some of us have run out of firewood. I blame the urchins and their early firelighting. Wickedness is what it is. And nobody we know has yet lost a tree this winter either. That is normally good for half-a-year's worth. And there is a Test Match to be watched tomorrow night from midnight. It's alright too for mr mike who will stretched out on his chaise longue in his day-glo budgie-smugglers but I shall be hunched up on the sofa wrapped in a blanket until the early hours.
Ack! I didn't win a prize but then I didn't notice the competition happening either. Oops.
I suppose it is either start burning the books or buy some more firewood, mr mongoose.
I'm sure mr mike looks very fetching in his day-glo budgie-smugglers. Talking about budgie-smugglers - long ago and far away I was duty probation officer in Solihull Magistrates Court when a case of budgie smuggling was called. Birmingham International Airport is just down the road from the Solihull Court, so we used to get all the strange air-port-related cases. I think I've told you about the lad just down from the hill village in Pakistan and his behaviour in the Solihull Ladies' toilet. The budgie smuggler was arrested as he attempted to enter the country with 44 live eggs of proscribed species. He was wearing a vest constructed with 44 fleece-lined little pockets, and in each pocket nestled a tiny, precious egg, being kept warm and viable by his body heat. Had he been successful, he would have been richer by many many thousands of pounds. The eggs were taken away from him, still in their vest, and taken away for incubation and hatching. Our chap had his passport removed and was taken away pending reports.
Anyway, it's a good news day! Julian Assange is not going to be extradicted to the U.S. of A., thus saving his life, and Margaret Ferrier, the SNP MP who allegedly breached the Covid regulations by travelling the length of England and a bit of Scotland by train whilst suffering from Covid, has been arrested and charged.
Shame you missed the competition. Were you looking out of the window instead?
We're still waiting for mr verge to tell us what topic he would like for his prize.
I usually take the budgie smugglers off after lunch. Mr mongoose. I'm rooting (Aussie slang) for India - they were great in the last game, the bowlers stood up. The weather is unseasonally cold (mid 20'sC) and a bit of rain about. Crowd capped to 10k at the SCG.
Mrs I: I know I didn't win, but I put a plea in for turning our attention to our American "cousins". They are imploding faster than a black hole on all fronts. We are watching history writ.
I vote for a recap of the Jimmy Galligan/Mimi Groves story (American madness, Mr Mike) with a John Cooper Clarke video clip counterpoint, say "Some Cunt Said The N-Word", which would also serve as a counterblast and antidote to that ghastly Scots Makar drivel...
v./
it's a well known fact that misery-gut-members of the establishment just don't get irony, mr verge - mainly as a result of possessing no analytical intelligence, no emotional intelligence, and frankly speaking, no actual detectable intelligence whatso-fuckin'-ever.
to my mind, it's amazing how the younger generation can effortlessly invent ways to use the nigga-word as an ironic universal label for all and sundry - indeed i even remember a white big brother contestant similarly falling foul of the non-street-wise media-establishment when, thinking herself to be dancing amongst the kind of bros she knew from the bristolian ghetto, exuberantly used the afore-mentioned "ironic universal label" in direct reference to her black british dance-partner.
clearly, this politically correct hysteria is partly a problem of idiom, but mostly of a failure by middle-class white people to appreciate being called niggas - even, apparently, when the word is spelt ironically.
They may not get it, mr ultrapox, but they sometimes come up with some corkers. My favourite is the choice of words engraved on Larkin's bit of slab in Poets' Corner: "...our almost-instinct almost true: What will survive of us is love." And it's a double-header - inevitably one carries the line on into another of his with the L-word, Love Again, so we get "what will survive of us is love again, wanking at ten past three" but maybe that's just me. The best bit comes when careful reading of the Arundel Tomb poem from which they plucked that "almost-instinct" steers us to a hidden-in-plain-view counterpoint, eeyorish nihilism at its finest: what will survive of us is nothing. In God's Haus, no less. Don't tell Prinz Charles.
v./
Makes my furniture and bracing isles look a bit underpowered.
Pay them no mind, mr bb. I'm working on your prize piece now and you are not allowed to change your mind. Furniture and bracing isles it is. You'll just have to bear with me for a little while, as I went back to work today after my festive break ( we Scots have 2 days off at New Year to get over the communal hangover, so with the weekend added in, I've quite got out of the work habit)and I'm fair scunnered.
Unfortunately the budgies had to stay unsmuggled for another 24 hours due a small calendar/upside down world error.
I see that Plod now wishes tobatter down my front door to ensure that I am two metres away from Junior and that she is properly masked up. That fiend, eh, of yesteryear Ishmaels passim and his love of 'necessity'.
It's "citizen-suspect Smith" writ large, mr mongoose. The Chinese must be pissing themselves laughing.
v./
I see that our "American Cousins" have been providing excellent television. I particularly enjoyed the abseiling domestic terrorist, as tottering Joe Biden dubbed him. He really does have some fine clothes, Sleepy Joe, but he's looking increasingly frail, with his oldman's walk. Yet again, Lawnforcement has turned its weapons on its own citizens. Remind me not to visit America.
I have to say, mrs i, that I like the Cousins in person but, jeez, it is a godawful violent country. However this is what happen when you treat people with contempt. Inauguration Day is going to be a treat.
That's spot on, mr verge. Not for the first time. I have already rehearsed the bairns. If asked, stay all dad-taught-smartness-of-old and simply say "Exercising" if on foot and "Food shopping" if motorised. But that, of course, is a defeat of its own not dissimilar to what is happenign across the Pond.
I can't stop laughing. Schadenfreude doesn't even come close. If this were any other country, the US would be shipping in weapons for the democratic protesters; activating NGOs; slapping sanctions on the Govt; pimping out propaganda from the MSM 24/7; forming a coalition of the vassals to enforce a rules based order. You can't make this shit up!
What was that song "the data America died" - Don McClean.
The consent of the people is wafer thin, mr mike, and governments everywhere would do well to remember it. The triggerhappy prat has apparently killed an unarmed decade-long veteran of the armed services. That's a sacrifice that ruin is made of.
More importantly, another terrible shot from Warner. Pucovski looks good but Australian good. With a proper grip on the bat he might even be able to play the moving ball in England. A young lad though. Miles to go before we sleep on a decsion on him.
The good news, Mr mongoose, is that the radar shows the rain clearing. Its still very cloudy here in Sydney, but no rain now. I played golf and spoke to one of the green-keepers this morning. They know the weather. He was feeling optimistic.
Bad shot by Warner, yes, but the Indians were bowling to his weakness. This could be a good test.
I like Siraj, mr mike, he has a bit of spirit and bounce about him. And nous. He has almost had Pucovski twice with that sparingly-used short ball. And they've only been going half an hour.
Mr mongoose: Big debate down here whether Pucovski should play because of his concussion problems. The short ball will do him. You can't bat with that in your mind. I'm not convinced by him. It looks a poor batting side to me with Smith loosing it. When play resumes, the Indians will have ideal bowling conditions.
Pucovski has the Oz failing of always backfoot, and then twitching the bat across the line pendulum like if he has to play forward. This is fine if the ball doesn't move but Jimmy will arise from his death bed in 40 years time and have him on toast in England. He looks like a boy learning - which he is. (He also reminds me of Hick.) He is young yet. I like his spirit.
As you imply, he is going to get hit in the head playing like that. And that is a serious issue for one so young and hit so often.
When play resumes, Sydney will be like English conditions. The ball will swing and move. Spot on with your diagnosis of Pucovski, Mr mongoose. He's being squared up and playing his defensive stroke laterally not forward. Sir Geoffrey must be fuming. At test level that is a fatal flaw.
Fret not, Mrs Ishmael, they're just talking about cricket - it's not a coded discussion about insurrection techniques that'll have our friends from Cheltnumb booking the ferry to Stromness in the morning.
Meanwhile Obama calls last night's performance "a moment of great dishonour and shame for our nation". Doesn't look like retirement had given him perspective - I mean, shouldn't that really be "another moment", all things considered?
v./
Sound advice to the younguns, btw, mr mongoose, but I'm not surprised it sticks in your craw to have to give it.
I expect putting a bit of rocksalt on the iced footpath near our house would be a grey area - making it vaguely passable might count as trying to encourage the neighbours to perpetrate excessive exercising or something. (At this end of town we are - officially, mind you - low priority when it comes to snow-clearing & ice treatment.)
v./
The good news is that the rain sent me to my bed. Otherwise it had 4am written all over it. I awoke to find, mr mike, that Pucovski got 62 but had three lives and his armour showed plenty of chinks. What is Pant doing keeping wicket again? I thought we had worked that one out.
In other news, Donald looks set for FedMax - pour encouraging the autres. This is all going to end very badly.
Not just I will be grateful to you, mr verge, for de-coding the cricket talk. Huge relief, for which, much thanks.
I like the Don McLean gag, mr mike.
@ultrapox - 5 january 2021 at 03:00
might i add, mr verge, that i consider use of the racial epithet by black people to be an example of the shameless cultural appropriation which in modern times has become so dreadfully pervasive in our society - and i feel sure that any blm shop-steward worth his salt would, in this respect, find himself in total agreement with me.
Post a Comment