{"id":646,"date":"2011-01-07T22:43:00","date_gmt":"2011-01-07T22:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/?p=646"},"modified":"2011-01-08T21:56:05","modified_gmt":"2011-01-08T21:56:05","slug":"spawning-time-salmon-eggs-a-poem-by-ted-hughes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/?p=646","title":{"rendered":"‘Salmon eggs’. A poem by Ted Hughes"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

The salmon were just down there –<\/p>\n

Shuddering together, caressing each other,<\/p>\n

Emptying themselves for each other –<\/p>\n

Now beneath flood-murmur<\/p>\n

They curve away deathwards.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 January haze,<\/p>\n

With a veined yolk of sun. In bone-damp cold<\/p>\n

I lean and watch the water, listening to water<\/p>\n

Till my eyes forget me<\/p>\n

And the piled flow supplants me, the mud blooms<\/p>\n

All this ponderous light of everlasting<\/p>\n

Collapsing away under its own weight<\/p>\n

Mastodon ephemera<\/p>\n

Mud-curdling, bull-dozing, hem-twinkling<\/p>\n

Caesarean of heaven and earth, unfelt<\/p>\n

With exhumations and delirious advents –<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Catkins<\/p>\n

Wriggle at their mother’s abundance. The spider clings to his craft.<\/p>\n

Something else is going on in the river<\/p>\n

More vital than death – death here seems a superficiality<\/p>\n

Of small scaly limbs, parasitical. More grave than life<\/p>\n

Whose reflex jaws and famished crystals<\/p>\n

Seem incidental<\/p>\n

To this telling – these toilings of plasm –<\/p>\n

The melt of mouthing silence, the charge of light<\/p>\n

Dumb with immensity,<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The river goes on,<\/p>\n

Sliding through its place, undergoing itself<\/p>\n

In its wheel.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I make out the sunk foundations<\/p>\n

Of burst crypts, a bedrock<\/p>\n

Time-hewn, time-riven altar. And this is the liturgy<\/p>\n

Of the earth’s tidings – harrowing, crowned – a travail<\/p>\n

Of raptures and rendings.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Sanctus Sanctus<\/p>\n

Swathes the blessed issue.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Perpetual mass<\/p>\n

Of the waters<\/p>\n

Wells from the cleft.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It is the raw vent<\/p>\n

Of the nameless<\/p>\n

Teeming inside atoms – and inside the haze<\/p>\n

And inside the sun and inside the earth.<\/p>\n

It is the font, brimming with touch and whisper,<\/p>\n

Swaddling the egg.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Only birth matters<\/em><\/p>\n

Say the river’s whorls<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 And the river<\/p>\n

Silences everything in a leaf-mouldering hush<\/p>\n

Where sun rolls bare, and earth rolls<\/p>\n

And mind condenses on old haws.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 The salmon were just down there – Shuddering together, caressing each other, Emptying themselves for each other – Now beneath flood-murmur They curve away deathwards. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 January haze, With a veined yolk of sun. In bone-damp cold I lean and watch the water, listening to water Till my eyes forget me And the piled … Continue reading “‘Salmon eggs’. A poem by Ted Hughes”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-river-report","category-salmon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=646"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":651,"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646\/revisions\/651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.finavoncastlefishing.co.uk\/bulletin\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}