i don't remember what i was watching, though i feel it must have been a documentary- what is that show on National Geographic with the funny little British fellow who puts himself through all kinds of torments? the hottest, coldest, wettest, driest places in the world... at any rate, i think it was he, who was on some tiny island inhabited almost entirely by tiny birds which flocked all day long in the skies over this little bit of rock off in the grim horse lattitudes of some remote sea. one of the few people who lived there was regarded as something of an eccentric even by his fellow islanders. he would wake up every morning and climb a steep hill holding a long pole with a net at the one end and a sack tied at his waist, and he would spend all day swiping teeny uccellini out of the air. when his sack was full, he'd go home and pour their soft little carcasses out onto his table, each little head rolling on a neck he had snapped between two fingers, and then he would pluck their feathers, bird by bird, and grill the creatures on his fire. this was his only sport, his only work, his only food, other than the plants that grew wild on the island. he didn't know how old he was, nor who his parents had been. the only things he knew were the net and the flocks, the necks, the feathers and the fire. sleeping, waking, the sea, sky, rocks, consumption and elimination. wind. bellwether.
what incredible clarity.