A Giclee Print Featuring a Pied Wagtail
An Open Edition Print Made in Our Own Studios and Available one size only
Reproduced on Hahnemuhle German Etching Paper... and below is a story about Patricia Wagtail...
Patricia was distraught. She'd lost her only baby.
“Oh, don't they grow up so quickly these days?” her neighbour, a scatter-brained blackbird announced, arriving in her usual flap onto a nearby fencepost. Patricia smiled. She was certain this particular bird made sure there was nothing sensible inside her head to talk about before she started talking about it. So Patricia smiled. She did want to reply. It was only right. She wanted to say something - something normal. But she didn't. She couldn't. What she actually wanted to do was scream. But she didn't scream, either. Instead, she just smiled. She smiled politely, took a breath and held on - tight.
Holding on was all she could do – it was all she had. Her only baby - the lone survivor - was gone. Gone! And her others... ? How could something like that...? She had heard stories, but never ever did she think... You never think! Do you? You never believe... because it's always somebody else; someone else far away whose whole reason for being was just crushed, and everyone says, “Oh, what a terrible thing!” Then they carry on as if nothing's happened. Because nothing has happened - to them. But for someone – somewhere – all that's left are memories – the sweet, smiling memories of beautiful ghosts.
She took another breath. Any minute now she was going to fall apart; she was going to break into tiny pieces. Her baby was gone. She wondered: was this his father? He had disappeared, too. One morning, off he went - he never came back. He never came back! Just after the first baby disappeared. He never came back. Was he falling too? He never said - never a word. He just stopped singing - just stopped. When things got tough, was it all too much? Had he just - gone, left her to it - because? But that wasn't him. That wasn't the wonderful father of those little babies. He was the most thoughtful... he'd never. Just leaving? That wasn't him.
From her perch on the guttering, she slowly scanned the garden. The Autumn air was still. A hatch of tiny flies, airborne close by, gently yo-yoed up and down; their wings sparkling silver in the sun. She didn't bother - she couldn't be bothered. She hadn't been hungry for days. The leaves were turning, the early ones, golden, gently falling, like a kite that's lost its breeze. They wobbled as they fell, slowly, clumsily. They needed lessons, flying lessons. Way too slow – they'd never catch a fly like that. She turned – looked down the valley, and wondered.
The late afternoon sun, warming her, soothed. Of course, there could be another reason her baby's father disappeared. But that thought was a spine-shiver too terrible. So she hoped he'd just left and was somewhere safe. She hoped he was alive and well. Because she really didn't want to think of that day - that day he never came back. But if she closed her eyes, she could still see him. “Back in a mo',” he chirped. But... all that time? He was away all that time. She kept looking and she kept wondering. She told herself he'd be back – soon. But now he was making her angry, and worried, and so incredibly scared. She began calling, but... he never came back. She wanted to ask, but was so afraid. Her neighbours, her good, kindly neighbours, or that stupid blackbird - maybe she wasn't so stupid after all - had someone gone out early that morning and cleaned up... the mess? Had that sparrowhawk suddenly come careering, high speed - low level, over the fence again? A little puff of black and white and – he was gone, forever. Had her neighbours thought tidying up would save her from... from what? From this!
Winter was coming and she would be alone. She was so - alone. Even the swallows had gone - and all those annoying little house martins. She wondered if the same thing had happened to them. But - all of them? They were a constant nuisance, she'd often criticised, but now – now they were gone... And they always seemed so happy. Without them the skies were so empty - so cold. Those young lunatics, tearing around at ridiculous speeds. They were far too young, so irresponsible. The parents were to blame. She blamed the parents. One day it would all end in... wait and see... one day. She raised her face to the clear blue above and wondered where all those happy little martins had gone.
But it was colder now. She shivered and hoped the cold would take her - soon. If it came early, winter wouldn't matter any more. Those long nights. Short days. Short of food. Always a struggle. But none of it would matter if the frost came early. She'd escape, drift away, and everything else would fade with her, including this Thing inside - eating her. That would die too. She smiled. She'd be free again. There'd be no more days spent remembering what she was so desperately trying to forget; no more stupid, always-in-a-hurry, blackbirds spouting unthinking nonsense; no neighbour who didn't understand that her polite little smile lived right next door to insanity. BUT... but, of course, of course it was now - right now – right at this very moment, when her strict wagtail manners forced her to sit and calmly listen to, “Oh, don't they grow up so quickly...”
“NO THEY DIDN'T!”
What they actually do is grow up in real time. You pour heart-and-soul into every minute of every day and they grow up sucking the life from you. And once you've given everything - they demand more. And so they get more – and you give more – you give everything it takes to get them to where they need to be: All-Grown-Up! And that - is worth it. It's worth everything. Every time you felt you couldn't go on, you did. Every tiny effort that made your body ache even more, in the end – was worth it. To see them standing there, ready to go, ready to fly. If - if they had all made it. But then, one by one, they began disappearing, until there was only one. One naked little soul struggling to stay alive – and you, single handedly, struggling to keep it that way. And the weight, the strain, the stress of keeping that tiny heart beating; that naked body from freezing; and that little mouth wanting even more; that was all down to you. It took every long second of every long minute of every never-ending day. And then, just when you begin to think you might have actually pulled it off - it all falls apart. That's when you know about life. That's when you understand that to get through you need... somebody. That's why now - now that you know there's nothing in the whole wide world that could possibly make that life any worse – you have to listen to, “Oh, don't they grow up so quickly these days,”
“NO THEY DIDN'T!”
From the roof guttering, Patricia launched into the air, looped skyward, then alighted, tail bobbing, on the woodshed roof. She cocked her head and peered down at the entrance to her nest between the logs. The last time she saw her only surviving baby was there – right there in that entrance. She closed her eyes and, once again, saw him leaving. He didn't look back. She wished him well. He never looked back. She hoped he would find his place, somewhere. She hoped he'd made it to somewhere warm. She hoped he'd find a family of his own one day. Maybe one day he'd come back and visit. She knew he was a good boy – he would come back if he could. He had grown so big, so strong. He was different – so different from the others, and the look in his eyes, so distant, always. And, bless, he only learned to say one word. Funny thing was, no one knew what it meant. She'd tried to teach him others, but all he ever said was his one little word. Patricia smiled, remembering his sweet little voice and his one - sweet - little - word... “Cuckoo!”
SKU: 1211