| Waiting on the boat in the sun. The boat hardly | | | | Her net hangs like long, fair hair. Illumination floods the |
| moves in the calm water. The sun hits every | | | | green mesh. Water banks on either side. A vapour of |
| smooth, polished surface and is blinding. All the boats | | | | mist spun from the fray. Light only to catch edges |
| are peeling out one after another. The forecast is | | | | and fringes, occasional expressions under yellow |
| good and though heading out to work there is an | | | | hoods, white shocks of water. Before our boats are |
| expectation like holidays. People look on from the | | | | joined with ropes there is time for the sea to seethe |
| pier. | | | | between us. The waves refract and fight. Just once |
| Ten days holed up in the town, no money, worry of | | | | we collide and hold our breath. The boats are only |
| changing fortunes, only drink... no money. Get the | | | | small and made of timber. |
| food on board, the ice, the diesel. | | | | Seventy boats, they say, after all that fish. Up and |
| The little punts tinker around the rocks for late | | | | down tracing their lines, nets stretched taut. All |
| summer lobsters. Maybe they feel a little jealous as | | | | through the night the boats haul up and men peer |
| they wave at the trawlers passing. Their time has | | | | from binoculars to see what they're competing |
| come and gone and our wake passes under them. | | | | against, what they can hope for. Estimates of how |
| When the sea opens up the boat seems small where | | | | much fish, last night, the night before; everything |
| not so long ago it was impressive and strong. The | | | | important here is in tonnes. |
| swell forces it right and left, slapping the water. | | | | Across the water, under grey glimmers of dawn |
| Standing on deck making last calls, last contacts. The | | | | rising, is a bright square of light below the deck |
| land goes away slowly; the boat moves slowly. The | | | | where a man in overalls stands- though it is only |
| sun is high and the land and sea under a haze. Rank | | | | because you can imagine his legs- waist deep in tuna. |
| of diesel. A puddle is still fresh on deck. | | | | The skipper moves his mouth without making a |
| To be out here is to be patient. Hour after hour the | | | | sound. He is scans for signs. Everyone waits for |
| sea is the same. It could be different if you wanted: | | | | accidents or fish. |
| the infinite ways it strikes the boat; the swells | | | | The net comes in the same as it went out excepting |
| catching up and slowing down with the changing | | | | the occasional tuna caught by the awkwardness of |
| tides; the colour changes from green to blue to grey | | | | his great pectoral fins, like fairy wings. Those trapped |
| at different times of day; the disappearing and | | | | in the folds are shaken free, go sliding down to the |
| re-appearing horizon behind rough white peaks rode | | | | others fuming at the cod end. Without a light in the |
| up by the wind. But it gets tiring and what comes | | | | sky the fish are seen pulsating under water, darker |
| instead is a pleasant and safe numbness: the sounds | | | | than the sea itself. Life is mostly extinguished from |
| of the engine, creaks of the timber, sounds borne of | | | | four hours trawling. Occasional flashes of silver. |
| the rolling water. When the hull rolls over the body | | | | The first clutch thump the timber planks, slither out |
| strains and you can imagine it is your bones that | | | | across the space. Thump then slither. Some have |
| creak. The constant rise and fall of the sonar song- a | | | | eyes ripped out, others stomachs (big frills and |
| sound connected to an unseen movement turning on | | | | blooms). They all have wide lesions from the nets. |
| top of the wheelhouse. | | | | Some are just abrasions, the silver skin flaked off to |
| Watching the radar for another boat. When it comes | | | | reveal faint pink flesh, others cut deep into their |
| within miles and isn't a mirage it is hard to believe | | | | dense bodies, rips and cavities. Lower jaws are |
| they are the same: the blot on the screen and the | | | | snapped, some clamp onto one another biting- like |
| blot against the sky. Below deck the smell of oft- | | | | one would bite a rope- some still flinch or even flap. |
| used oilskins and boots, salty and not unpleasant. On | | | | Amazing considering: they should all be drowned, |
| the walls the only picture is the framed drawing of | | | | dragged backwards in the water so their gills are |
| the boat before it was made. | | | | flooded. |
| Sleep when you can even if the sun is high. Eat when | | | | The smell I couldn't define- the bloody wreck of fish: |
| you can even if you aren't hungry. All of this time is | | | | briny, sweet, fresh, rotten. There is no break- the |
| waiting and preparing for the fishing grounds that | | | | violence all happens before sunrise, the bodies can't |
| creep up, nautical mile by nautical mile. 100 miles, 200 | | | | be left till daytime. In the ice-hold the fish are |
| miles, 300 miles. Every view is the same, every sleep, | | | | delivered by a winch then thrown onto their bellies in |
| every smell, every sound. This is the numbness, the | | | | the tight honeycomb shelves. The pick axe swings |
| inaction, the peace. There is very little talking. | | | | against the blocks of ice. Lifting them by their arrow |
| Within hours the fishing grounds will arrive. A straight | | | | head tail fins, like pendulums swinging. The tuna are |
| line from land to sea to find the tuna fish who swim | | | | bedded down in their frozen shelves. The cold is |
| here every year when they come to their fishing | | | | sharp. One says 'I thought hell was hot'. A whole bin |
| ground to find the garfish who come to find their | | | | is kept aside, full of fish that bear no resemblance to |
| fishing ground to find the clouds of plankton that | | | | what we'd know, or buy- all features erased, no |
| have no ground but the wandering ambition for | | | | precious silver skin remains. |
| sunlight. | | | | The clear prints of bloodied hands are wiped off the |
| Wake up. The bunk is always dark but there was | | | | walls and pipes where someone found support during |
| never the need for action- fumbling for clothes. | | | | the night. A hose pumps water into the hold. |
| Up the stairs to deck there is, before sight, an insight | | | | Fragments of bone and fin are gathered by hand so |
| that things are different: the proximity of others. In | | | | as not to block the drains. The rest is scrubbed |
| that black night the sea is not all ours anymore. Lights | | | | away. Only the smell left. |
| light up the world, dozens of lights, in seamless | | | | At some point the engines are killed for everyone to |
| blackness of sea and sky, floating in vast empty | | | | sleep. The only time the only sound is water sloshing |
| space. But it is not empty: the swell and the spray | | | | outside and in, the inescapable creak and maybe, if |
| and the creak are still there; the sea is always | | | | the swell is high, the shake of the cutlery in the |
| present without being visible. Boats on a black | | | | drawers. |
| sea-field. | | | | Twelve hours work shelved underneath our feet |
| 'Mid-water trawling requires the two vessels to meet | | | | when we meet together in the galley for tea. Tuna |
| in open water, connect the header and footer of the | | | | steaks fry in the pan for breakfast. When the day |
| net to one another and then separate again.' | | | | comes the boats have gone. |