At Roane Head
[Ed: this is the first email I sent to Ben
after I knew he was dead...I came across it when looking back at my
communication with Ben in April and May 2022...the text was, as usual
between us, minimalist...]
From:
Andrew Corser
To: Ben
Corser
This is a different view of the selkie legend:
https://genius.com/Robin-robertson-at-roane-head-annotated
Dx.
[By way of explanation: Ben was very touched by the book, 'The Selkie
Girl' - a picture book telling a mermaid story from Northern
Scotland. In his tributary painting, Shoris painted a selkie,
representing Ben's spirit.
The poem, At Roane Head, has a selkie man rather than girl, who
fathers four sons with a human woman...but he was not her
husband. The husband murders ('relaxes ... with a small knife')
all four boys one drunken night. She tends the graves by putting
blankets on each grave at night. Then she, presumably,
decapitates the husband, as she gives his head to the selkie father in
a wooden box, along with a twist of each of the boys' hair.
It was printed in 2008 in the London Review of Books -
one of the sources of writing Ben and I shared, and would discuss
together. LRB carried on sending Ben's copy to my address every
two weeks until August, when I had them cancelled: I could no longer
bear them arriving with my copy.
¡Que haya luz! Kerenza ha yeghes da! Dad/Grandpa/Andrew x]