Jay or Jackdaw. Some of the apparent inconsistencies may be intended to confuse the listeners.
23 (K-D 10)
My beak was close fettered, the currents of ocean,
running cold beneath me. There I grew in the sea,
my body close to the moving wood.
I was all alive when I came from the water,
clad all in black, but a part of me white.
When living, the air lifted me up,
the wind from the wave, and bore me afar,
up over the seal’s bath. Tell me my name.
Barnacle Goose. There was a popular belief that it was born from a barnacle growing on wood, the plank of a boat, or a submerged tree trunk. Dr. Johnson’s first definition of Barnacle is “A bird like a goose, fabulously supposed to grow on trees.” The “currents” in l. 1 are literally a mountain stream.
