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The Severn Serpent

from Fish House Blues by Daniel Shaw

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Eels are mysterious animals. They return to spawn in a single oceanic ground then the glass eels swim up the seven, turning to Yellow eels. They can lie in muddy ditches and rhynes for up to twenty years, often wriggling over the field to reach them. Becoming mature silvers, they may return to the spawning ground in the oven to renew the cycle.
Welsh legends talk of the Severn Serpent, a benign monster, perhaps the giant eel that pulled Nudd's chariot? Known to the Romans when they annexed the Brittonic people, he was the lord of the sea and the deep caves and mines. Gwyn ap Nudd, when the Romans invaded, was instructed to measure Britain and find its Navel: the omphalos. This was in Oxford where he dug and uncovered a white and a red dragon - representing the indigenous people and the invaders. He re-entombed them in Snowdonia.

Hundreds of years later, Emrys was called as a boy to find why Vortigern's fortress foundations kept collapsing. Merlin explained about the dragons under the foundations. They were said at this time to represent the Saxons pushing the Celts the backdrop for the Arthurian myths and underpinning much of the identity and myths of the changing nation. When they fly free pestilence is said to be loosed on the land. Writing in the pandemic, we are in a time of national change and questioning our identity.

We are closer to South Wales than we realise - connected by the huge tidal range of the Severn and its Bore. In Somerset, we discount the estuary an unattractive: Hinkley point and muddy sands of Weston Super Mare. The tides are too dangerous and the mudbanks discount water tourism and fishing fleets (other than the extinct Mud Horse fisherfolk).
In Victorian times, piers were erected such as at Clevedon and steamships went from here - even commercially from the train station (now lost) at Burnham. Burnham, like the Glastonbury Canal, was a failed economic endeavour - the hotels were set up as a major link for the railway to South Wales. When the ships floundered on the mud banks and a tunnel was dug to link Gloucestershire the whole thing failed. It became another ghost town like the medieval coastal villages that were swept away by the tidal wave of 1616 that lapped against the Tor in Glastonbury.

The parish church of Burnham lists in the unstable sands as does the Victorian tower of Highbridge Church which had to have its heavy Spire removed.

lyrics

The Great Eel Chases the Bore
down the tidal Funnel.
Glass Eels Return from spawning in Caribbean Seas

To Swim the tidal scoop
up the Severn;
then the Brue

to lie and hide in ditches
Sliding up muddy banks
to find their way to wetland;

Lurking to places to hide
and slide
and become yellow;

Dragging bellies
over drowned roots
and Ramshorn snails

To slyly lie
hidden from Herons,
Bitterns, Great Egrets and Otters,

Till Twenty Years pass
and the Silver
returns to the Sea

The tide reaches inland with its powerful fingers
But the Serpent tastes Mud, Hides and Lingers

We turn our backs
to the estuarine blankness,
the bleak muddy sands.

Did glass eel fishermen live here
before Sixteen Sixteen's wave
washed away Brean?

To leave sad Dunes
and bare
Heath Meadows

Till train and canal
connected the Celts
with the Iron Steen Ships moored

Avoiding mud banks
Or away to France
and Grand tours.

Now Ghosts of Inns
Rot by Pale Arcades
as punters submarine through Gloucestershire tunnels,

And the parish church lists
like a steamship stuck
on a mud bank.

The tide reaches inland with its powerful fingers
But the Serpent tastes Mud, Hides and Lingers

In the Brown churning waters
The Serpent Slides
with the tide

Pulling Nudd's chariot:
The Chthonic Lord of the Mine
and the deep Brine.

Did She swim the Severn inland
to the Omphalos of Oxford
to find A Roman Wyrm entombed?

Locked in fierce embrace
with a Celtic Red Beast

Re-entombed by Gwyn in Emry's
Halls to wait for Vortigern.

Now it's our turn
as they fly free
And a Plague falls on all our Houses.

The tide reaches inland with its powerful fingers
But the Serpent tastes Mud, Hides and Lingers

credits

from Fish House Blues, released April 20, 2021

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Daniel Shaw Glastonbury, UK

Daniel Shaw based in Glastonbury & S.W.area.
Past work includes performances with the poet Laureate, Simon Armitage; & performances in Europe, Tennessee, Kolkatta and the Uk.
Daniel has also performed and recorded with the The Aardvarks, double bass & Bass with Mossflower, The Minor Works Unit, Mr Keep Calm & The Cancelled Cheques, The Blackdown Bluebirds andThe Duncan Batey Trio. ... more

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