river / run an ecopoetic trilogy by Helen Moore
river / run has emerged out of Dr Helen Moore's twenty-year creative practice as a pioneering ecopoet and socially engaged artist. Grounded in a commitment to support the shift towards an ecocentric paradigm, Helen's work recognises our intrinsic interdependence with the more-than-human world, and the catastrophic harms that our collective anthropocentrism is causing.
river / run is made up of three long-form landscape ecopoems, 'Findhorn Bay, Waves of Flow and Flight', 'Dorset Waterbodies, a Common / weal' and 'Edge of Wild River'.
Helen Moore's relationship with Atlantic Salmon (Salmo salar) began in September 2017, when friends took her to see the Salmon run on the River Findhorn in North-east Scotland.
"We’d clambered down from a small stone road bridge, stepping carefully over slippery rocks into the narrow gorge. Rounding a clump of Birch and Alder, we were met with the wild river less than a metre from our feet. Dashing over boulders, the noisy torrent was making waterfalls, fierce eddies, and pools in its rapid descent along the short stretch that was visible. It took a moment to attune my eyes amidst the watery chaos. There they were, moving magically between water and air, leaping against the rushing current, throwing themselves up the boulder-strewn river. Mostly they seemed to fall back, disappear, dart back round. To try again. And again. It felt agonising to watch, and to ease the tension my friends and I began cheering the Salmon on like spectators of an endurance sport, crying out whenever they tumbled backwards and were dashed on the rocks, as if we ourselves were suffering these hurts and setbacks.
At this stage of their life cycle, Atlantic Salmon are fully grown adults returning home from their long migratory journey into Arctic waters to spawn in the river nursery from which they originally grew. This first experience of a Salmon run filled me with questions. How do these extraordinary creatures, revered in Celtic mythology for their wisdom, navigate without the satellites and maps that we humans require? How do they recognise their natal rivers? And why are their numbers diminishing so rapidly?"
-An extract from Helen Moore's introduction
river / run, a trilogy of long-form landscape ecopoems about British rivers and Atlantic Salmon written by Helen Moore in collaboration with scientists and artists responding to the climate and wider ecological crisis. Complementing the ecopoems are photographs by David Buckland, installations by Animate Earth Collective and Hanien Conradie, and river paintings by Jim Murray.
‘Helen Moore is a poet of the luminous present and a precursor of ecopoetics. When asked by the public for contemporary poets writing about the natural world, Helen Moore is the first on our list of recommendations.’
- Chris McCabe, Head Librarian, Poetry Library, London
‘Helen has the extraordinary ability to understand and digest the complex scientific concepts and processes that take place in the natural world, translating them into inspiring poems. As a scientist, I recognise the significant value these poems contribute to our field. They serve as a powerful instrument to connect with communities that traditional scientific communication struggles to reach.’
- Professor Genoveva F. Esteban, Bournemouth University, UK
‘The story of the endangered Atlantic salmon, that most iconic and romantic of animals, is in desperate need of telling, and Helen’s stunning poems about its almost mythical life cycle grasp the baton that Ted Hughes left with works such as ‘October Salmon.’
- Jim Murray, actor and activist