May ~ Taynish Art Trail ~ The Sail

​My submission for this piece said that I wanted to create a collaborative piece working with my father, combining art and literature, the stitched and the printed, the written and the spoken word.  

The stone Poetry seat

​Already identified as a wonderful spot for sitting & looking, standing and staring, it inspires the writing and sharing of poetry and stories, with someone’s ingenious idea of the poetry book box and notepad, I am drawn to tie all this together.  Although there isn’t a lot of boat traffic on the loch I would like to reference ‘man’ in ‘nature’ and to create a sail shaped windbreak with an original poem, or perhaps the legend of the Loch Sween monster, stitched and printed on to it, so that adults and children can sit, sheltered from the wind and read the words aloud.

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​I used to live in the village of Tayvallich and as a dog owner I would regularly walk them down to the mill and on to the loch as all three dogs loved playing in the water.  I would sit on the bench over-looking the loch or walk along the shoreline throwing sticks for the dogs, picking up driftwood, pebbles or shells, looking at the view, wondering who else had walked before me.  What lives had they lead.  I would watch the occasional boat sail or motor down the loch, becoming an insignificant speck on the horizon, dwarfed by the vastness of sky and sea. 
Revisiting this area recently I was conscious of those same thoughts and feelings, but this time sitting on the Poetry seat.  My father and I, with the dogs snuffling around, sat for a while contemplating the history and the landscape.  Then he started to tell me a story, as he did when I was a child, leaning against his shoulder listening to his voice, feeling it rumble through his chest, this one was about the Loch Sween monster the tale began to unfold…
Another time, another place, another child, another father, another story…