THE FISHER KING
From the desk of admin@penkilnburn.com
Thursday the 11th of July 2024
Good Folk,
It seems King Boy D has transitioned into a Kingfisher. As in one of those birds.
In his confusions, or maybe that should be Konfusions, King Boy D has arrived at a conclusion, or should that be Konklusion?
This morning, he stumbled out of The Garden Shed clutching in his right hand a faded copy of The Galloway Gazette. If we could read the date on this crumbling and fading local newspaper it might tell us it was published in the Spring of 1958*. But nothing is that certain. And while he was stumbling away from The Garden Shed we might hear him muttering something from the Arthurian legends.
Muttering something from the Arthurian legends is not unusual for him to be doing. This muttering was not aimed at any one individual but more at the universe as a whole. Not that the ‘universe as a whole’ was or is listening.
But...
If we were to listen into his mutterings, we might hear a repeated refrain ‘For I am The Fisher King’
And...
If we were to read words in the fading and crumbling copy of The Galloway Gazette from the Spring of some year in the late 1950s, we might read a story about the Minister’s Son. Or at least a story about an event hosted by the 12th Earl of Galloway, in the grounds of the Earl’s hunting lodge, as in Cumloden House, on the banks of Penkiln Burn. It seemed many folk had been invited to celebrate the return of a White Hart to the Earl’s hunting grounds. The White Hart is a mythical deer in the Galloway Hills, but also a reality, even if a very rare reality. And this White Hart was the first seen since before the Great War.
And...
If we were to read deeper into the article, we would see some passing mention of the Minister’s Son reportedly seeing a flash of electric blue heading up the Penkiln Burn. And that this flash of electric blue being a Kingfisher.
And...
This bird, as in this Kingfisher, was the first Kingfisher that had been seen heading up the Penkiln Burn since before that other war that was not so great. What this story in this fading and crumbling local newspaper from the late 1950s would not tell us, is the conversation that the Minister’s Son was having with the son of that then 12th Earl of Galloway.
You should be informed now, that for some reason, the people of Galloway referred to their Earl as Magpie. And his son as Baby Magpie.
And for the purposes of clarification the Minister’s Son might have been about 5 years old, and Baby Magpie might have been about 29 years old. But both were children. They would always be children.
And...
As anyone from those times, and from that Galloway, would know, Magpie had married an American flapper back in the 1920s. And this American flapper was also a wealthy heiress. And this wealthy American heiress, who was also a flapper who had married into ancient Scottish aristocracy, knew none of the ways of this lost corner of Scotland, even though she was now its Countess. I wonder if she knew what the White Hart symbolised in Arthurian legends.
And the people of Galloway knew this Earl and Countess of Galloway had a son. And this son was to be the heir to the seat of Galloway. And this son, who the people knew as Baby Magpie, was strange. And Baby Magpie saw the world differently. And at the age of 23, and because Baby Magpie was strange and saw the world differently, had to have his brain lobotomized, at the Crichton Lunatic Asylum in Dumfries. Having one’s brain lobotomized was what was done, in those days, to try and stop people from being strange and seeing the world differently.
The information contained in the previous paragraphs is vaguely fact as much as anything is vaguely fact. Although these facts might just exist as faded and crumbling memories in King Boy D’s head, they are also vague facts that can be checked on what is left of Google and Wikipedia and all those things that also might be fading and crumbling by the time you read these words.
But...
What is contained in the next paragraph can not be checked anywhere except by scanning the fading and crumbling memories inside of King Boy D’s head.
At this event in the grounds of Cumloden House, on the banks of The Penkiln Burn, in a Spring of the late 1950s, the Minister’s Son and Baby Magpie were standing on the Chinese bridge** over The Penkiln Burn staring down into its waters. And as they stared into those clear waters they are talking. And although Baby Magpie is in his late 20s, he seemed to the Minister’s Son like a child no older than himself. And they were talking about the things that young boys talk about in places and times like that.
‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ asked Baby Magpie.
And the Minister’s Son answered...
‘I want to be that electric blue flash that just flew up the Penkiln Burn.’
‘You mean that Kingfisher?’
‘Yes, I want to be a Kingfisher but maybe not that Kingfisher but all Kingfishers.’
What the Minister’s Son did not tell Baby Magpie was that he had already started to touch the loose electric wires together. As in the wires for the plug of the bedside lamp in his bedroom. He would do this to watch the blue flash that would go between them before the bulb in the lamp would blow. And for him this was one of the most exciting things to watch. And how this Kingfisher bird that had just flashed up the Penkiln Burn seemed like it was a living version of that same thing. And because of that, being a Kingfisher must be the most exciting thing to be. He also didn’t tell Baby Magpie how he liked electric shocks. Electric shocks make you feel more alive. Feeling more alive is good.
What the Minister’s Son did say was...
‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’
And the Baby Magpie answered...
‘I won’t be grown up until my father is dead. And when my father is dead, I will have to become the 13th Earl of Galloway. And the people will then call me Magpie, even it is behind my back I will hear them.’
‘What if you don’t want to?’
‘I can’t choose, like I could not choose to have my brain changed when I was 23 years old. They will change your brain as well when you are 23 years old.’
‘But what will you have to do when you are the 13th Earl of Galloway?’
‘I will have to go to a place England called The House of Lords and take my seat. My father hates going there and taking his seat. He tells me the place is filled with Crows and Crows attack Magpies. And people will expect me to know everything, and my mother always tells me I know nothing.’
And the Minister’s Son replied...
‘But I like not knowing things.’
‘Why?’
‘Because when you know things, those things become boring. And when you don’t know things, everything is more exciting. Like I don’t know why that bird called a Kingfisher has to fly up the Penkiln Burn the way it does, or why that Kingfisher looks like the flash of light when I touch the two wires together in my bedroom. And maybe if I was a Kingfisher, I would get that feeling that I get when I get that electric shock.’
And Baby Magpie said...
‘But... I thought when you grow up you would have to become The Minister and stand in the Kirk and read those stories in The Bible and marry people.’
And the Minister’s Son said...
‘The stories and pictures in the Rupert Bear Annuals are better than those stories and pictures that are in The Bible.’
And Baby Magpie said...
‘But the stories and pictures in the Legends of King Arthur are better than Rupert Bear. And in the Legends of King Arthur there is a man called the Fisher King and he was once a Kingfisher. Maybe you will be the Fisher King when you are an old man, but the Fisher King has been wounded in a battle against the English and one of his bollocks has been cut off. And his lands are now in disarray.’
‘But was he still a Kingfisher at the same time as being an old man with one of his bollocks cut off?’
‘I think he was.’
‘Then I will become the Fisher King when I am an old man.’
As stated above, this conversation cannot be verified by either reading the pages of a faded and crumbling copy of the Galloway Gazette or by reading all the pages of Google or Wikipedia. But this conversation does exist in the fading and crumbling memories of King Boy D as he stumbles his way up from The Garden Shed. And if you found the time, you could find the very Chinese bridge over The Penkiln Burn in the grounds of Cumloden House, where this conversation may have happened.
For now, we have to return to this King Boy D who is stumbling up from The Garden Shed to the house in Suburban North London where I am writing this email to you.
And...
What I need to tell you is that King Boy D, as I write these very words, is clutching a pain in his left groin with his left hand, and is transitioning from being whatever he was in his head to being the Fisher King with his lands in disarray.
And...
This Fisher King will take the form of any real and physical Kingfisher that you might see flashing up a stream or burn or river as you walk its banks, even if the one in the Legends of King Arthur did not,
And...
As such, as he is no longer King Boy D, he will have to step aside from any of his perceived duties concerning The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu. Or how The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu in their many forms might progress into a real or imagined future.
If there was to be any future fiscal transactions that would have benefitted a personal bank account of King Boy D, it will have to now benefit a British Ornithological Trust bank account, in the hope it might trickle down to him as a Kingfisher.
And...
If Kingfisher is ever expected to sign their name, someone else will have to stamp an image of Kingfisher on the said document.
Of course...
When the former human version of King Boy D, slips on the doormat of life, the various factions of his still living family may have different views.
As for that Son of the 12th Earl and Countess of Galloway, he inherited the title when his dad died in 1978, but because he married a working-class woman from Duns and not an American heiress, he was disinherited from any of the family wealth, and he died in poverty in 2020.
But if you would like to see footage of his mother crowning the Queen of Galloway in 1933 click HERE
Kind Regards,
Post Script:
The wound in King Boy D’s groin might only be symbolic or might be the fact that his left bollock has shrunk, and his lands are now in disarray.
*What actual year in the late 50s or maybe the very early 60s is unknown to me.
**In the head of the Minister’s Son, The Chinese bridge was like the one on Willow Pattern plates, and may still be over the flowing waters of The Penkiln Burn in the grounds of Cumloden House.
