the migration of swifts piece…

Since a small child I have scanned the skies awaiting the arrival of swallows, house martins and swifts. In one house where we lived, the swallows nested under the eaves of the bedroom window. At a village school where I taught later in life, the children watched the skies from the playground waiting each Spring with excitement. The arrival of these little birds is one of the biggest markers of my year and I miss them so much when they go… the soundscape of my summer…

The skylarks are another real love, and I walk the big field listening to their soaring song and trying to work out their subtle colouring as they rise from the meadow grasses. I capture sound recordings of them, but later it seems these were all on windy days so the clarity was not so distinctive and I watch and listen to them during the rhythm of my walking – these are birds that belong in my heart and hold a special space there.

This year I was fortunate that where I live it was possible to join in with a local initiative to ‘swift watch’ – looking for their arrival, nesting sites and patterns of behaviour. The sounds of their presence is usually my first indicator – I sense and hear them before I see them – they seem to emerge into my consciousness. Evenings walking with friends, talking to folk about these wonderful little birds, promoting their cause in various ways, the thrill of watching them fly so fast into a nest spot folding their wings at the last second has been a highlight and a dream to be actively involved with.

This quilt piece has been years in my mind – maybe even decades. No new dye baths as the stack of naturally dyed tones seemed to already be waiting in the wings!

Even the quilt pattern – flying geese – has been long thought of and planned out in my mind as a very simple migratory pattern. The swift watch initiative helped me focus and realise the piece as the research, reading, discussion and action about saving the future of these birds was so frequent during the days and evenings of late spring and summer.

Sitting at my grandmother’s machine working on the piecing, their sounds came through the top windows and, in the evenings, sitting outside and watching the skies the screaming parties swirled overhead…