Jacqueline and the Dippers

One morning I found the small, broken body of a male hedge Sparrow in a plant pot on the back doorstep. Wrapping him carefully in a tissue, I decided I would do something to honour his life when I next visited River. I made a floating bed of reeds and lichen for his last journey to the sea, like a nest, and gently laid Sparrow’s body on the top, decorating around him with some rose and chrysanthemum petals. Complete, I sat next to him for a while singing quietly, admiring the flash of yellow on his beak, the deeply wooded shades of his feathers. I found a good place to launch this floating nest-shrine into River, whispering words of love and thanks over him, asking the world to accept his body and spirit back into the all-that-is, before leaning over the water and gently pushing the nest-shrine out into the current.

I then sat for a long time, humming a new tune that came to me and made me tap the rhythm out with my foot. I hummed and swayed and tapped for a good long while, entering a kind of trance, sometimes eyes closed, sometimes not, just feeling the music and rhythm stirring within before it was released to join the music of River, of world. As I stopped, a burst of birdsong – Sparrow, Blackbird, Robin – rose from the trees behind me as if in tribute to the dead Sparrow.

Then I noticed Dipper on a rock close to the opposite bank. As soon as I saw him, he started to sing, a gurgling, watery, river song. He sang and sang, and I watched and felt held, as if he were singing a spell that I was bound to, as if he knew the effect of it on me. After a good few minutes, I heard another Dipper begin to sing on my left, downstream from the first singer. I watched as she dipped and sang like her mate, their voices joining together in stereophonic joy. I felt very much the tri-partite configuration of the three of us, as if each bird were singing into each of my ears, holding me between them. Then with a big dip and final flourish, the second singer suddenly stopped, flew toward her mate who also took flight, and together they whirred around the corner and were gone.

The following week, when I visited River and started to sing, to my great surprise the Dippers appeared, streaking low over the water in front of me. They stopped on the same rock as last week and started bobbing, as if dancing to my song. Then, to my great surprise and deep pleasure, facing me, they started singing too. The joy/surprise/disbelief I felt at being seen, acknowledged, joined with, is immeasurable.