2022, waves on the agean sea (the leyline, 2:07, mp3) 

mont saint michel

sunset, and the crowds are leaving. the sea is racing in – cresting washes push fast along the narrow sand gullies, surrounding the island, cutting it off, chasing up people from the rocks and beaches, chasing up sand flies and midges into the narrow alleyways where we rush heads down hands flapping.

wandering the streets for the quieter places a robin lands close by, stands, eyes bright, time stopping, sound stilling. flies straight at us and away as a van swerves past up the hill.

outside the walls a small group of people. watching the rising tide, the rising rock, the rush of foaming sea, the light catching gulls skimming the wide hushed surface away from the land - and the raised arm, catching the golden evening sunlight – light the colour of Delos sand and sky.

morning, and the puffing buses arrive again. heavy with the pilgrimage of tourists, flow of feet and chatter, sunglasses, shorts, sun hats, holding hands, gazing up through the small dark streets of ice creams and plastic prizes, crepes and omelettes, men sweating in tightly fitting dark suits sadly serving hot dinners, starlings and pigeons and rooks watching the spending, the exploring, the aweing, the eating, the children chasing and imagining. So many poses for phone photos and selfies with the gilded copper angel at the top of the tower.

Michael is beyond – outside the walls of mont tombe gazing out to sea, up in the logis des etoilles and wondering. down here in complexity and ordinariness we’re searching for the magical in flower faced gargoyles, in the hum of the drill resounding through the abbey, in the swirl of the sea, the silence of a robin.

feathers drift down. white as the butterflies on Delphi.

over the summer of 2022 we(me & mark)followed an old straight track from Delos, through Delphi, up through Italy to Sacra di San Michele and through France to Mont Saint Michel. we made the journey in a small EV – a 2018 Zoe – with around 150 mile battery range when the wind was with us. and we listened in to the hum of the earth along the way, making musical sketches, and both of us writing blogposts and poetry as we travelled. this work is now an album of songs and soundscapes. it was released by Reverb Worship in April 2024 with an accompanying 24 page booklet. 

Click here for the link to Bandcamp and the story of our journey is also available as a blog - here.