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Shetland Wren, spring 2022

Too long have I awaited this joyous month of April, free from March – this month of miracles & tears – even if gales and remnants of winter are clutching at straw…

The island is slowly emerging from its great seasonal slumber to start and display more vibrant colours as daylight is overriding black.

Too long have I looked at my homeworld from behind glass overlooking an empty loch. Even though I love the view, my eyes belong to the younglings facing me during term time.

Vista fae North Loch Drive.

Watched snow come and go, return since our passage through the Vernal Equinox – morning and dusk in many tones, yet always with the same magic, as our sun rise and glow over Mousa Isle, to colour this Western sky in the kerb just before Quarff.

Only one road fae S to N – also known as da meal road by many islanders whose ancestors in the 19th century, at a time of tattie famine, were (like in the rest of the British Isles, and most notoriously reported from Ireland) rewarded with a meagre meal to build roads… Attempting to survive dire times in the history of the isles. The cheapest labour anyone with gold could find…

Two other side roads in the South Mainland linking da tuns (or human settlements) were added to the great North-South road. Those remain my favourites. Teeming with life, mostly wild, they turn magical in spring.

Da Clumlie Road

This is where freedom begins.

For seasonal cycles on end, the magic remains intact. The return of life, skylarks (wir laverick) arriving with meadow pipits & oystercatchers (wir shalders) depending on the year, though after shelducks (our traditional earliest migrants) . Northern wheatears (wir steinshaakers) also land back in our fields and meadows by April.

The elegance of loons, red-throated divers follow suite.

Tis when our land and sky turn cacophonous on a boannie day i’da voar (a sunny spring day).

Skylark, Meadow Pipit and Northern Wheatear, Apr 2022.

April is when our gardens begin to share flowers and buds against all odds. Haily puckles and thin snowflakes might still rage at this time of year, all seem to resist so far…

I love their resilience.

A return to my old belfry – Sumburgh Head where I worked 20 years ago this month as an ambassador for nature (RSPB Nature Reserve) – proved wonderful with a friend on Monday. We lunched in style overlooking the magnificent panorama. Strangely enough, Martin Heubeck roamed my mind as I was watching empty cliffs. Yes, it was barely early April on a day of hellery (adverse weather). Yet kittiwakes, guillemots and razorbills are coming back every year in fewer numbers.

Tis no secret.

Our great marine birds signal the return of better days from April onwards. By the time you discover the headland around da Simmer Dim (the summer solstice) you are welcomed by bird calls from every directions, as well as constant gannets fly-pasts on their way to more and more distant fishing grounds. They are striving as a species around our coastline.

Yet barely weeks to Beltane and the galloping to the solstice. Tis when the island really turns cacophonous.

Meanwhile, we make do with chilling conditions, and brace ourselves for days battered by gales and hail that keep you alive (!)

Tis a world bathed by a sea and an ocean, geographically so far away from it all, sheltered, somehow from any torpor…

And yet, listening to the whole world.

Hame

This place on Earth and in my heart where I belong, because my senses say it so, has recovered seasonal white, or even bluish icicles now we stand so far from the sun.

And yet shorter days can shine.

This morning, I’m waking up to a hot bowl of porridge whilst the cabin heats up a bit. If my duck down quilt kept human and cat warm whilst the temperature plummeted below what can be read on room thermometers, that polar wind from Arctic Tromsø is still blasting…  Tis the realm of Yule encroaching on my Nordic world.

Yule, the festive time as we come to a halt – light candles on window sills or on chimney mantlepieces… Share a table free from the pressure of time, tokens of love and marvel at the starry sky from the back steps of our own home.

My bowl of porridge cooled too fast.

This little light we cling onto as darkness vanishes juist a few hours to let our star hover below 10 degrees of elevation either in a shameless crystalline sky (or sometimes in a halo that fills a light metallic sky) feels so precious. Tis the moment to wander through mires an braes (mossy areas of fields or meadows and hillsides) and reconvene with our own bays bathing in light.

How I love walking to the sea.

It fills my heart with happiness, this inner peace that has no price. Tis this moment when we reconnect with the higher self, the child within eager to reach edge of the most magical world.

Because it really is magical!

The blue of sky and horizon so inviting, the playful selkie (seal) inside kelp – the gentleness of water flirting with pebbles as tide retreats at a slow pace… Our Earth’s rhythm allows it all.

All around us, what looks barren and just dormant under snowflakes will wake again in a few months. Yet, for now, my whole world shines in blue and white. As as snow melts on higher grounds, wir local burn swells and runs down to the sea. Cycle of water, source of life.

Late.

Our first snow came late this autumn, not till the end of November. Mother Earth has her own agenda. Unusually warm, Hairst (autumn) felt a long Indian summer… Only to vanish inside flying gales the island knows at this time of year. We brace ourselves for the season of bleaker times.

First snow feels a welcoming sign winter with its palette of own colours has its own grip on us.

First snow invites us to get out and reconnect with Mother Earth, Nature and life we can take so much for granted… Blessed with the place that holds so many treasures, the call of the wild is strong.

First snow has come and gone, yet each return of icicles draw us so closer to the magic of Yule. My heart rejoices at each furtive appearance from our boreal sun. Today, it is shining in a glacial NE wind, and as the cabin warms slowly, I will make my trek out, refill my heart and let da bairn inside to reconnect with the natural world. It feels my shield against the artificial world – that manmade realm shackled to the material, where gold prevails above sand grains, shells and pebbles.

My island is my treasure chest.

shenanigans

There are moments when we just need to step back and dream…

Step back and sleep, dream in the arms of the dragon. April the joker, the trickster, that turned the island back to ice.

Our spring buds deprived of sap, light and that warmth, had to yield to the wrath, shenanigans from a planet déboussolée…

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It all happened within minutes…

Even Saoirse the Cat had to give in to da bliind moorie -a violent snow storm – that engulfed us in its millions of horizontal icicles.

I’m pretty sure she dreamt of bees and bugs she loves so much to play with… She looks a meerkat on her back limbs. So comical at times.

I was dreaming of summer.

Voar – our springtime – is a season to respect. As Mother Earth turns generous once more, life in all its forms begins again. The island back in a sky filled with birdsong – oystercatchers, curlews, skylarks and snipes to name but a few… We seed to harvest and yet we are aware of its harshness.

In their life-driven waves, our seabirds feel magnetised to our cliffs. Guillemots, razorbills and puffins had to battle a polar flying gale to reconvene in our boreal world.

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Life back on land

April still clawed by cold air.

And yet nature is resilient. From daffodils to primroses, from Skylarks to Meadow Pipits or Northern Wheatears, wir voar means life.

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On and around the island, magic occurs. Last weekend alone was graced by a pod of orcas on Saturday followed by a showcase of wir tammie nories (that delightful local name for our Atlantic Puffins) at sundown.

Magical.

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We really live on an extraordinary planet.

It does not take much to tear down preconceived ideas and marvel at the diversity of life. The trick being to open our eyes and heart, and feel part of it.

Life is everywhere: in the wild, in cities – Mother Nature finds her ways in the most incredible places, from a stone wall to the great depths of our oceans…

We are all guests on our planet, that has a twin, so different.

Now, the following piece of verse is all about our Earth’s sister.

Planet Walk (Venus) 


YOU ARE HERE,

between 
Mercury and my world, 
one grain of 
sand on a lone beach, 
                                     in easy reach to 
solar winds, rotating eye around 
                       stardust; 
you, Earth’s 
sister, 
encased in hell and 
                    toxic clouds, 
                    sun, volcanoes and hurricanes – 
you too look blue from the distance through 
a filter. 
So far away from 
                              Tahiti, you caught the eye of 
                                          a captain when 
you appeared as a black disc, 
so elusive before 
                             the sun. 
Amazing grace, 
your rotation in slow motion – 
                         each sunrise lasts, 
          days outclass years on 
your surface – 
the odd one out waltzing clockwise in 
                       our West sky. 
You are beauty without seasons, 
               hottest of all, void of 
water, rocky-basalt in a cocktail so 
                                                            Molotov… 
Satellite irresistible, 
                you are goddess among the stars, 
                        no one will dare to plant 
                                                         a flag; 
                       but 
still wonder if 
                      there is life, 
                                          love in 
                                                     your 
                                                           clouds.✨ 

© Nat Hall 2021. 

I love my homeworld.

spaekalation

November, month of hellery – this fine Shetland dialect word that encapsulates the worse from the sky in the form of storms of any kind – enshrouded in darkness since daylight feels more and more elusive.

Hel, hell, hellery, as 2020 has never matched our expectations; held us hostage within our walls, and loved ones disappear…

Spaekalation – another fine Shetland dialect word that translates as gossip – is a raw piece written at night, as an attempt to deal with both the savagery of the sky and a sudden and an unexpected bereavement. This poem was first written in the dialect and then translated in English

spaekalation


Whit's yun?

Is yun a gooster or a ghoul?

Twa goggly eens i'da tree, 

is yun an owl o some kind?

Ta da dare-say o'da mirken, da vaelensi is juist

begun;

dey say dat ghosts ir among wis,

waanderin, lone, aroond
wir laand - dy an

me hoose,

da tattie crö, barn an byre -

dey say dey travel wi da flan an da snitter,

skid juist laek bairns apö

da snaa an glerl o ice,

hide i'da white o'da moorie ta

mind da reek o chimney stacks.

Dey say dey sit by da fire atween

da caird an da wirsit -

da Slockit Licht,

crabbit embers ta keep 

da memory alive.

Deir shadows

glide alaang da waa,

listen ta da saang o'da nicht.

----

Gossip

What's this?

Is that a messy gust of wind or just a ghoul?

Two goggly eyes inside a tree,

is it an owl of some kind?

To the hear-say of dusk,

That brisk downpour has just begun;

They say that ghosts are among us,

wandering, lone, around

the land, my and

your house,

the spud corner, barn and cowshed -

they say they travel with wind gusts or biting cold air,

skid just like kids on

snow and ice,

hide in the white of a blizzard to

reminisce smoke from the stacks.

They say they sit by the fire, between

carding tool and the yarn -

Extinguished Light,

dodgy embers to

keep the

memory alive.

Their shadows glide along

the wall,

listen to the tune of

the night.


© Nat Hall 2020

For you, dear Nybakk Clan ♥️

wind of change

We are never fully aware of things until they skelp (slap) you in the face.

My first drive back north to catch the sunset at Mavis Grind – the gateway to Northmavine, the north end of the main island – turned far darker as I caught windfarm ground work in progress with trucks at rest at the foot of hills along the A970 off Sandwater Loch. My heart sank. So far, I had only gazed at stills and drone footage in social media… All of the sudden, it became real.

For years, I have marvelled at Central Mainland – Sandwater, Kergord, da Lang Kames… Nesting, Voe – legendary places of wilderness teeming with rich and varied life. For years, we have been wrestling with a nightmare that will change life and lives – wild as well as human – forever.

For years, I have walked the shore and shared it openly: take a picture of it all before it is changed for ever.

We have lost a battle.

Yet instead of the expected pictures taken from the roadside, I thought of friend & artist Paul Bloomer’s current project entitled Shadowed Valley.

Whilst Paul has been developing his response on canvas through the main medium of charcoal, selected recent pieces of his work struck me over recent time.

Shadowed Valley by Paul Bloomer

Shadowed Valley by Paul Bloomer

In turn, I am expressing in words as my response to his work. With gracious thanks, Paul, for your kindness & powerful work.

Da Death Valley

Winds of change,

listen to the silent valley.

Through the darklands we now wander –

round da paets’ broos, where

whimbrels nest,

gigantic claws obey men’s will;

among heather & crowberries where

merlins hide their love and genes,

metallic claws slash & plunder deep through

this land where

redshanks call, protect their youngs between a loch and

Peta’s print,

way past the ridges of wir Kames,

Lottie’s Half-Way Hoose and

Nesting.

Shackled men to demon-money only

see gold, far away vaults,

far too oblivious to

ravens,

whimbrels, merlins or

mystic mountain hares, Heather Ling or rich purple bells,

the divine sanctuary of life.

Men dunna ken,

they come with trucks as giant claws rage through wir laand,

rape in peace to satisfy needs

whilst

nearby folk dread the shadows of longer blades,

Don Quixote’s nightmare

far north.

© Nat Hall 2020

Poet’s Notes

da paets’ broos: (Shetland dialect) the edge of eroded peat (turf); da Laang Kames (place-name): the long valley shaped from Sandwater Loch to the Village of Voe and Nesting area; Peta: (from O.N. & Shetland folklore) name given to a giant that fell asleep in the valley of da Laang Kames; “Men dunna ken”: (from Shetland dialect) expression meaning “people don’t know”; wir laand: our homeland.

Shadowed Valley by Paul Bloomer

Resistance

Da Lang Kames, Shetland Mainland.

Da Lang Kames, from O.N., “Long Ridges” . This is a part of my island. A magical gateway to this last corners of wilderness, as BBC Wildlife broadcaster Simon King once defined Shetland.

There is a deep blanket of peat, a rich, precious, protective and fragile habitat about to be destroyed in the name of greed by a few. In spite of a seven year campaign or so, wir community ignored when alternatives exist. A too grand-scale project and areas of special scientific interest decimated by bulldozers… Folk impacted notably involve Nesting, Aith and up to Vidlin, as da Kames extend East and West.

Central Mainland, Shetland.

They want a 103 turbines of that size scattered from wir Lang Kames to Vidlin.

Do not take me wrong.

Not against renewable energy – but against the sheer size of a wind farm in such a small gem of archipelago & impact on my local environment: destruction of peat blanket, loss of precious & fragile habitat… Wir rural community ignored for years in the name of money, as well as long-term impact on tourism, incl. eco-tourism. A terrible mistake for Shetland.

There are alternatives that could have made us independent from this hellish national grid: peerie community turbines (tidal or wind). Instead, sold out to a giant parent company (SSE) for snap short-term profit… Utter Disgrace.

I want to believe it is not too late. Too late to save the rest of Shetland from those who want to destroy it.

If you too have visited my islands,

You will have marvelled at these magical places… Maybe you drove/were driven along the N/S road along da Lang Kames to reach magic places like Eshaness, Uyea or Toft on your way to Yell and Unst or Fetlar, wir North Isles…

Thanks to Billy Fox for the graphic images.

Shetland is world famous for its many natural and archaeological treasures –

To plunder it this way is both eco-genocide and damaging to our community.

Please share the logo and help us save Shetland. Thank you.

Hairst

Seasonal gathering of silage.

Hairst

Da shalders* have moved on. Da playing fields, once

more silent.

Their flight calls,

memories.

As

summer’s

sliding into Hairst,

wir hame sky changed

its song; tis now

time for

sheepdogs,

shriek calls from

young blackbirds still

clad in brown

feathers;

mass

gathering of

life around cliffs and

headlands, our

first sign of

winter.

Now

silage

rolled in bails,

the winged world can

move on, our

gulls will

fill a

sky and

join Aeolus in

his quest for new songs.

8 Aug 2020.

NH

#

Golden Plover in cotton grass

Poet’s Notes

Hairst means harvest, and is also the Shetland name for autumn, derived from Norwegian Høst & German Herbst…

Shalders, the Shetland name for oystercatchers.

wildaboutshetland

Sumburgh Head, our most southerly headland, where nature blends with RLS and his family of lighthouse builders.

When Viola invited me to contribute to Island Dreams 2020, I felt honoured and jumped at the opportunity to pen my love of this archipelago for her project. Shetland is this very special place where I live, love, share and celebrate without bounds.

Hjaltland,

From the O(ld) N(orse), Hjaltland is above all the Old Viking name to my home islands, wir Auld Rock, as we love to call Shetland.

To get back to da Auld Rock is to go hame, or home… Or heim if you are Norwegian in search of cultural connection, or sailing adventures.

I have always regarded Shetland as a collection of hidden gems inside a blue (or jade… Or metallic grey, as our sky defines it!) casket. Living on the fringe of Scotland – as north as you can go, and yet full of surprises. Together with Orkney, Shetland form the Northern Isles.

Looking towards the Atlantic from the Scord of Wormadale.

Yet each island group remains distinctive in every way – including flags and dialects – and both have to be explored.

An adventurer’s paradise

Nestled between a sea and an ocean on the 60th parallel, da Auld Rock has everything to offer. From history, language, culture, food to nature. And our natural world is magic! After all, it is not for nothing naturalist & TV Broadcaster Simon King once defined it as one of Britain’s last corners of utter wilderness...

Wild and spacious, looking towards St. Ninian’s Isle in the North Atlantic.

Ideally situated at the crossroads with Scotland and the Nordic world (Norway to the East, Faroe & Iceland, North West) we are both the most northerly edge of the UK and the Scandinavian corner of Scotland!

Whilst Orkney has wonderful, lush gentle slopes and rounded heads, Shetland offers both gentle and more rugged landscapes (from mini-fjords to towering cliffs via miles of moorland) with a greater diversity of habitats (due to its own collection of rocks, ranging from soapstone to serpentine, via sandstone, limestone or pink granite to name but a few…) which, in turn, offers unparalleled wildlife at and around 60N… In one word, breathtaking.

Shetland ponies in buttercups

We are a maritime world, and what best but discover it from the sea – highly recommended in summer, as our Roost (the open area where tides from the North Sea and Atlantic collide) feels far friendlier than in winter…

Looking towards Hellister (headland, left) and Norway!

Hame is a land where we lose sight of horizon, as sea and sky become one…

Hame is a land where boats are more than a way of life… If an Orcadian is a farmer with a boat, a Shetlander is a sailor with a peerie (small) plot of land.

Whilst only two inhabited islands are accessible by one-way bridges, a boat will take you about everywhere, including to birds!

Hame is anchored in history, from the very earliest human settlements to today, where we have made a close-knit community.

South Shetland Up-Helly-Aa, a unique fire fest postponed till 2021 due to CO-VID times…

Curious about it? Jarlshof remains one of our most impressive archaeological sites that is so unique in Britain, for it offers us a time walk unrivalled… Another hidden gem!

From Dunrossness to Unst, our most northerly inhabited isle, the land is littered with Norse and pre-Norse treasures.

Nature…

Nature, naturally natural!

Hame is that place to get away from it all! Throw away your watch to the sea, and dare ask time to a selkie…

“Just give me five minutes, will you???”

From flora to marine and avifauna, we are ruled by nature, in turn, ruled by seasons and the sky.

You too are a keen nature lover? Then Shetland is for you!

Shetland so inspiring…

From the darkest nights, at times coloured by our Northern Lights (Mirrie Dancers) in winter to our azure nights (Simmer Dim), where our sky’s filled with birdsong, Shetland is alive.

Aurora Borealis from my back garden.

But in summer..

Blue night known locally as Simmer Dim.

Here, dare to virtually explore further : nordicblackbird60n for I love to record my homeworld as a photographer.

The magic latitude

This is hame, home, as I live and love it. So I speak, share and write about it as a poet with so much passion. When the time is right, and if you too wish to leap to this Auld Rock, stay for a while, and want to walk this shore with me, your adventure will truly start either on board MV Hrossey or Hjaltland.

Eyebright

Et si vous voulez tout cela en français, je me ferai une immense joie de partager ma maison shetlandaise avec vous. 😌

Suivez-moi… Follow me 🙂

See you soon, and fair winds!

Bon vent, et à bientôt !

Literary works: From Shore to Shoormal/D’un rivage à l’autre (BJP, with D. Allard, 1992) and Compass Head (Nordland Publishing, 1996)

Contrasts

Summer Song

I am

the blackbird perched out loud,

serenading to wind and

fog;

I am the voice

between branches,

whisper from the breeze

evening skjump *

I am the crooner of hillsides,

the long billed one in

solstice grass…

I am

the invisible song,

the one that slashes through

silence – finds meaningfulness on

fence posts, offers feathers to

drum and Earth to advertise

love and presence in

hope to be heard by the sky.

And watch your spirit

chirp and thrive, as

time tick-tocks to

Earth’s cycle;

sparkling

sparrow in stereo,

the one that chirps out of nowhere…

I am daylight beyond belief,

the one that clads night

azure blue –

grey or

plain white according to

wandering fog.

I am what they call da Simmer Dim.

© NH 2020.

Da May Snaa

Da May snaa juist does’na exist,

da flukra,

juist a bairn’s daydream,

peerie man’s imagination –

a moorie caavie i’da bowl, laek beremael gröl… Far tae

white fur

da Simmer Dim;

far tae cauld fur

da Mayflooer,

da kattiklu or

da blugga.

© Nat Hall 2020

Snow in May… Not a daydream.

The May Snow

The May snow just does not exist,

The gentle fall of fat snowflakes, just

a child’s daydream,

little boy’s imagination –

a blizzard in a bowl, like

porridge oats, far too

white for

a summer’s night;

far too cold for

our primroses,

bird’s foot trefoil…

marigold.

© Nat Hall 2020