NANCY COOK worked seven winters on the Bering Sea, first as a NMFS domestic observer and later as a roe tech on the pollock mothership M/V Golden Alaska. In 2004, she earned her MFA in Creative Writing from University of Alaska Fairbanks. And in 2005, she joined the full time faculty at Clatsop Community College in Astoria, Oregon where she teaches writing and literature and edits the award-winning RAIN Magazine. The mother of one daughter, she continues to spend summers in Alaska, where she directs the annual Wrangell Mountains Writing Workshop and tries to eat plenty of Copper River reds (www.wrangells.org).
VIDEO
Nancy Cook performs "Bahia de Concepcion" Video courtesy of Brad Wartman, 2013.
WRITINGS
The Bering Sea Brand of Beauty
I could tell you about the Bering Sea’s brand of beauty—a beauty I came to cling to my during winters in a womanless wild west that was my world for months on end. My days at sea were marked by the horror and the beauty of the creatures that emerged from that cold dark depth of near-certain death and so much bountiful, beautiful sea life.
I could tell you about the beauty of bycatch trapped in a trawl net and dumped in my blue biological sample baskets. Sea creatures identified first from the hand book, then later recognized as friends. Outrageous creatures, like the leopard skinned wolf eel—his sharp teeth and slimy skin—evil and yet unsayably beautiful. Eel-friend—who alludes the deckhand’s gaff, to survive three conveyer belts and exit the factory with jaws still clenched to a gray cod three times its big-sea tiny-size.
I could tell you about deepwater grenadier—the most primitive of longliner bycatch—a creature more like a monster than a fish with golf-ball bulging eyes and a long scaley tail that would melt almost, upon entering our world of sunlight and air. The rollarmen never liked to bring those grenadier onboard for my samples. Through sleepless haze they shuddered at the slime--hairy fins clinging like tinsel to the orange rubber of their raingear.
I could tell you about seabound Chinook—truly the royalty of the seas. Salmon so bright, it made the Pollock appear to be a caste of peons. As an observer I measured each king’s length and weight, plucked scales for my manilla envelopes and then cradled each bright torpedo body before tossing it back for a death at sea.
I could tell you about the absurd beauty of POP rockfish: spikes of neon red entering grey air, a comical brightness slicing through time as the longlines sliced the green-sheen of the seawater. I could tell you about the sadness of trawl factory filled with red sandpapery flesh. Discard, bycatch, pointless death. Or I could of the joy I felt for the ones who got away: the eight foot halibut who snaps a longline gangion to swim free—diamond of bright belly meat disappearing into dark depth.
One week, three sleek orcas appeared to eat every Greenland turbot from the miles of factory longline. The haul back hydraulics would sound an alarm, and like clockwork they arrived. Vera, Verna, Veronica, I named them--only known females from here to the Pribilofs. Identified to individual by the scars upon their invincible black backs. With freezer half empty, our greenhorn skipper would happily have shot the threesome dead. From the deck I chanted, and they seemed to listen. There is a mermaid singing beneath the engine’s roar.
I could tell you about Aleutian seabirds: the silver plumage of emperor geese, the orange-lime bill of king eiders. Crown jewels of the north, a birder’s coronation. I have watched the blue-billed albatross ride the wind on eight foot wingspan. I have chuckled with the whiskered auklet, a miniature wizard, stranded by storm and scurrying to stay warm on stern of cold deck metal.
No, working the Bering is not only cold feet, a sore back and fear.
It’s not only huge waves and huge factories. The Bering Sea is also home to beauty—a sublime elegance heightened by the rawness that surrounds it
There is a salt-winded, wild magic to the whole Aleutian chain—Unimak Island, Shishaldin steaming. Pribilofs rising like breadloaves from days and day of nothing—Bering Sea blank horizon.
I could tell you about the Penn Air commuter from Cold Bay. Days in a dank cannery waiting on weather, and then the one clear, cold morning—red lava streaming fire along lines of snow-covered mountain. Real live volcanos erupting, and life itself exploding through the fear-pent rock inside me.0
Yes the Bering is also beauty—a bittersweet beauty that is full. Like the music in a walkman that drowns the howl of wind on a rare walk away from the ship, bittersweet music that fills the body as it stumbles a blustery rock shore. Music that never sounded so good, a Bering sea brand of music, like beauty, that never needed to sound so good before.
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And on the topic of music/beauty: here’s one I used to sing into the wheelwash. Acapella, engine drum, whine of hydraulics for back up.
Angels Singing
Halibut cheek, albatross beak
Kittiwakes diving with bright red feet
Angels singing, Angels singing
In my soul, in my soul, in my soul
Pollock slayed by the metric ton
That the way the North sea’s gone
Angels singing, Angels singing
In my soul, in my soul, in my soul
Down south the daffodils and crocus bloom
Here on the ship it’s still metal and fumes
Angels singing, Angels singing
In my soul, in my soul, in my soul
Orcas feeding on the skipper’s longline
Turbot meat tastes mighty fine
Angels singing, Angels singing
In my soul, in my soul, in my soul
North wind’s freezing a salty spray
Looks like this lump is hear to stay
Get out the bat, put on warm hat
If you wanna stay alive you better do it like that
Coffees run out, cigarettes too
steward’s getting chased by an angry crew
Angels singing, Angels singing
In my soul, in my soul, in my soul
Pribilofs rising like white bread loaves
Far away a fox chases red back voles
Water spirit swimming swimming round my head
Makes me feel glad that I’m not dead
Angels singing, Angels singing
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Longliner Vocabulary
This little glossary was actually scribbled in a personal journal I kept during a three month contract as a NMFS observer on a factory longliner targeting grey cod and then turbot out of Dutch Harbor and St. Paul. After orcas hit the line, we spent thirty-five days without seeing land. The steward ran out of coffee & cigarettes. It wasn’t a pretty trip, but when on stage, I try real hard not to cuss.
A is for Ass, as in a**hole. See also greenhorn.
B is for Bait, as in chopping bait, moving bait, squid bait and herring bait. B is for baiting, the verb—a generally miserable task that ought to be done by machine.
B is for Bunk: see also rack, a stinky place you’ll rarely be.
C is for Cod, as in black cod, grey cod, P-cod, ucking cod. Cod that’s called product. Cod: the bread and butter of the boat. Cod: a protein you see a lot of in the galley when the trip goes long and the burger and chicken from the walking are running low
C is for Codfather: see also skipper.
C is for Codsucker: see also greenhorn—but try not say it too loud because at least one of them claims he is trying to quit.
C is for Chart: You damn well better not call it a map.
D is for Dumbshot: see also greenhorn.
D is for Dutch as in Dutch Harbor: nearest beer, nearest phone, nearest plane that might, one day soon, fly you home.
E is for Enough.
F is for uck, ucking, ucker. An all purpose noun, verb, adjective. Sometimes a "noun-verb-adjective” all strung together after the coffee pot launches in a storm. Ucking gear. Ucking greenhorn. Ucking cod. And me: ucking observer, ucking itch.
G is for Gear: the source of all misery
G is for Greenhorn: the ones to blame for ucked gear.
H is for Hell: your life during cod season. Sixteen on, sometimes more, down for four, up eighteen more.
I is for IBU, as in Ibuprofen. 300s, 500s, 800s milligrams. The mate is the guy who has more.
J is for Jackass: see also greenhorn.
L is for Line: only a greenhorn would call it rope.
M is for Margarita: last place the boss saw saltwater.
O is for Old: which you’ll be before your time.
P is for Porcelain, which the greenhorns are hugging.
Q is for quiet: this is no place for whiners.
R is for Rope: Go home greenhorn!
R is for Rack: see bunk, wish you were there.
S is for Splice: the way two lines of life come together.
U is for Ugly, as in cod, ugly uckers/
Y is for Yes: affirmative. You did sign that contract.
Z is for Zip as in Zip It! Shut your mouth! Bait that tub.
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Contemplating Postmodern Theory
in A Time of Global Warming
It’s not enough to just read poems
Not enough to write them, even.
It’s not enough to understand, or
Just stand by--
Yet standing by is just what’s done
(with poetic justice in its court).
It’s thirty years since Joni sang
of life’s illusions from Both Sides Now
and no one since know where to stand.
Activists went out of style when irony came in
in the name of understanding we’re all standing
on our heads. Meanwhile the ones who overstand
become outstanding in their fields, and the upstanding
make choices for the rest of us.
The problem with postmodern thought is that
it’s all about the problems; meanwhile,
the ones who still allow themselves ideas
dis-solve this world we stand on.
Postmodern theory provides tools for navigation,
but that doesn’t mean we don’t still need a boat that floats.
I have been to the Bering Sea six winters over
no one searches for truth inside a storm wave.
One roan whitecap blows out the wheelhouse
windows and there’s no communication. No
global positioning. A wall of seawater slams shut
the door to your private stateroom. It you’re lucky
a sister ship drags you into harbor. If you’re not lucky
you disappear into a word that just means drowned.
Don’t deconstruct your life raft. Don’t discard
your survival suit because the color orange seems
to you uncouth. Compassion will never rhyme
with complacency. Detachment is not the same
as living life detached. It’s December now
ninety-four degrees in Burbank. Forty-eight and
raining here in Fairbanks. It’s not enough
to just read poems, not enough to write them.
A good poem should change your life. If that’s
postmodern, I’ll post it. If not,
well,
then,
this mailbox is open for a letter from the future.
