The First Bird
It’s Friday 10th July 2026 and we’re in the middle of a second heatwave.
Words are weighing down my already too-hot head and need to be released. They’re indifferent to temperature, although the fingers that will type them are thicker, like my belly, retaining every drop of water the body can hold.
The first bird who takes us into conversing with feathered kin is associated in some traditions with being ‘the gateway’. It usually opens our ears to the dawn – occasionally even in the dead of night (spoiler). Adopted as the bird of the smithy, they both engage in bashing hard objects repeatedly. Its color links it to understanding of the Energies of Mother Nature and it’s symbolically seen as a herald of an ‘inner call’.
My inner call is to find the nearest place to sit, drink something cool and free the story of ‘Clock Clock from Cornwall’.
I’m on an errand in the town of many churches - Wilton - and drawn to an old friend, an English pub a stone’s throw from Wilton House. Even the bar menu will make it an indulgent stop, but its quiet ambiance beckons.
Taking the shady route down a side-street I’m surprised to be confronted by a young ‘Clock Clock’ blocking my path. Struggling to keep a worm and two grubs in his beak, he looks at me approaching but makes no attempt to move. Slowly crouching down to be closer to his viewpoint, I utter the only blackbird I know…
‘Clock Clock’
He turns his head, appearing to acknowledge the greeting, but isn’t going to let go of his wriggling lunch. Shifting to the road so he can enjoy it, I marvel at the mystery of serendipity, wondering as I have done many times what ‘clock clock’ means in 'blackword'.
But if I wanted confirmation that this is where our journey begins, I have it.
Here’s a blackbird who - as far as I’m aware - has no mind-reading capabilities. Does he sense it’s my day to record the strange antics of a member of his family?
No time to muse. Fly with me on his wings to Marazion in the far West of Cornwall to a tiny basement which was meant to be my home, but morphed into a shop... [tomorrow, bear bloggers!]