Wren Sing a Song

2024
Woodcut

Kergord valley in Shetland is heavily laden with the memories the many families evicted during the clearances, a valley that is currently enduring a second round of clearances as the epicentre the largest onshore windfarm in Europe that is being built all around. I went to the trees myself already heavily laden in search of solace from the trees that grow there.

The day was damp, and the sound of the trees was silenced by the machine gun like clatter from the army of drillers, diggers and exploders that had descended on the land.

I sank deeper and deeper into a melancholic dis-ease and peace was not to be found. Suddenly wren sang a song that breathed life to all around. An ancient memory was awoken, of a song embedded in the trees the plants and the earth, a song defiance in the face of destruction that holds us all together.

‘Wren sings a Song
Wren sings her songs
Make my heart sing
Pain casts no shadows
I am free
Out of the sadness inner love is born
Wren sings of sorrow no more’
Alex Purbrick