Curlew’s Call

Written in March 2021. I wrote this whilst undertaking a nature-writing course. The prompt asked me to describe a natural sound.

First a shrill worm of a whine rises from the tumble of rocks and slick mud. It stretches to a higher pitch as another note, fractionally lower, slides alongside in repeated dissonance. As it winds up the scale it becomes a euphoric reach for unknown heights. I feel it in my chest as I do when hearing the searching, heart-breaking top notes of Allegri’s Miserere.

Then the tension releases into shimmering waves, glinting and rippling until they finish with a piping question mark.

It’s a sound that tastes of salt. It concentrates something rapturous, melancholy and untameable as it sinks again into the sea-creased shore.

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