The Mermaid Of Zennor Sequel

Once upon a stormy night a lass called Nat having spent rather too long down the pub went for a walk along the cliffs at Zennor for a bit of fresh air. Searching for a sheltered spot for a sit down she heard a song smooth as melted chocolate. It dripped deliciously into her ears and she was spellbound.

‘Oh my God’ she thought, ‘not only am I drunk and very dishevelled but I’m also hearing voices!’ Glancing over the rocks she clocked a green-dreadlocked woman with a fish’s tail. Never having experienced psychic phenomena other than the visual slur brought on by too much booze she was rather shocked. However, in spite of her shaking knees she crept forward for a closer look.

The mermaid, who was none other than Morveren, turned and took off her shades as she caught sight of Nat then slipped quickly into the foaming waves. There was a sudden gasp and the sweet song stopped mid flow. Nat swore she saw a man's hand emerge from the breakers, but was it in greeting or a request for help?

She blew her nose and was about to head back inland when a bloke, completely starkers, dragged himself onto the rocks. She didn’t know where to look. Seaweed tangled his hair and there was a greenness to his skin as if algae lived upon it. He was none other than Matthew Trewhella weathered by a decade of waves.

‘Kiss me!’ he shouted, ‘Kiss me!’ leaping over the rocks, but Nat legged it like there was a devil at her feet. Alas, mist made the path near invisible and though she scrambled she couldn't shake him off. Then BAM! right in front of her glowered Morveren and an enormous creature with long white locks and beard, a crown of crustaceans and a huge pitchfork in his fist. A fish tail long and green and covered in pearls and shells curled to his side.

‘How dare you steal the husband of my daughter!’ yelled he. ‘I am King Llyr of the Mighty Ocean and no one crosses me and keeps their life!’

Nat felt like she was going to throw up the several pints she’d earlier guzzled. Three, two, one puke...nice. Well, not nice at all. Then the naked man quick as a flash grabbed her and planted a smacker on her sicky lips. She nearly fainted with shock and embarrassment combined.

‘We’ve got to get to the village!’ he yelled and half dragged, half carried her along the cliff edge with the two mer creatures slipping along close behind cursing the jagged rocks, their anger instigating the adverse weather conditions of thunder, lightning and the mother of all gales.

‘I was bewitched by the mermaid a few years back and forced to live beneath the sea. Only the kiss of a mortal woman could break the spell and you set me free me. I don’t half crave some chips and a pint of ale.’

A bolt of lightning struck nearby scorching Nat’s hair giving it a metallic whiff, though it wasn’t as potent a smell as the fishy reek exuded by Llyr and his daughter of the waves. With one last scramble Matt and Nat made it onto tarmac amongst the amber glow of street lights.

‘Back at last!’ yelled Matt of the golden voice ‘and it’s straight to the Tinner's Arms for me.’ With that he dropped Nat and dashed to the pub door.

Nat herself was less fortunate. King Llyr, having caught up, carried her off to the fishy depths where she now shivers with the tide and cries like a seagull for the kiss of Matthew Trewhella who doesn’t hear as he’s too trolleyed and loved up anyway with a local bird.

The Mermaid Of Zennor

Once upon a time not so long ago there lived a man called Matthew Trewhella. He was the finest singer in the Land’s End area of Cornwall and knew all the old ballads as well as some raucous ones too. He sang at folk nights, in a couple of bands and in the church at Zennor on a Sunday, a village nestled amongst granite rocks and yellow gorse.

One day a beautiful woman came to the service, slipping in the back of the church. She had heard his haunting songs drifting over the waves of Pendower Cove that was her abode for she was a mermaid of the sea and her name was Morveren. 

She begged her father King Llyr that she may go on land to see the man who sang such exquisite songs and after many a plea he agreed but on the condition that she let no human see her and that she return before high tide else she would be trapped on land and perish. So she swam to the shore and hid her tail beneath a sarong embroidered with pearls and coral. Painfully she crossed the tarmac of the road and entered the church where she gazed at the golden-haired man before her.

Each Sunday she returned, always disappearing before the service ended that none may see her. But one week she sighed so deeply he looked to the back of the church and saw her and fell instantly in love. 

She slipped out of the church as fast as she could but Matthew ran after her and as she fell he lifted her up, catching a glimpse of her fish’s tail. But his love was so great he cared not and in an instant made the decision to spend the rest of his life with her in the deep turquoise sea.

People ran from the church and tried to catch the couple but magic was on their side and Matthew raced over the rocks to where the tide crashed white. They dived in and all that was left was his t-shirt floating on a wave’s crest.

To this day if you wander out at night onto the headland at Zennor you may be lucky to hear the sweet singing of Matthew Trewhella and see Morveren sat on the rocks combing her luxuriant green hair.

The Ship Inn

‘I was down The Ship Inn t’other week and this lass walked in like no other lass I’ve ever seen before for more like a cat was she with head of brindle fur touching lightly her tracky top. 

'If I’d’ve been into psychic phenomena I’d’ve said she was a visitor from a parallel realm or the consequence of some fairytale enchantment. 

 


‘But, being  a simple bloke who loves reality TV, pub grub and a nice cup of tea all I could do was sit, mouth agape, staring into those fathomless eyes until a well hard bloke piped up, thus breaking cat girl’s tingly spell.

‘Oi, where’s my pint?’ yelled he. 

I glanced amongst the empty glasses on the table, drips sticking beer mats to table top.

‘I see not your pint mate, maybe you finished it?’

‘With that he aimed a ferocious swipe throwing me from my comfy fire side seat, spittle splatterering the wood chip wall of decades old dart holes.

‘He then staggered out, beer gut squishing. I fell to drinking my ale but, looking around, I perceived cat girl had disappeared! 

'I heaved a weighty sigh as I feared I had fallen in love with this enchanted lass now heading down some darkened alley where tom cats howled.’ 

So Are You Listening?

...Her husband didn’t and ended up with his riled wife armed with a very large sword pinning him to the wattle and daub wall. Fortunately for him, she let her angst out on his beard rather than his jugular, severing it from his aghast face with one fatal slice.

Unfortunately for him, his beard was his pride and joy, a fiery ginger carpet tumbling down to his fleshy knees and praised in many a poem by the clan bard.

This marital incident was immortalised in verse due to the two them already being notorious characters involved in many an infamous cattle raid of the Celtic era. The stanzas, performed by quick-witted bards singing along to enchanted harps, were passed down through the ages by subsequent poets, troubadours and random delinquents, culminating in the collected works entitled, ‘One Woman One Sword: The History Of A Warrior Queen And A Beard.’

The epic poem has been translated into modern vernacular by Professor Hilary Figg to mark Women’s Day 2011. The original, being 1,279 verses in length, has not been printed here due to issues of space and reader’s attention span. However, the Celtic Queen herself who went by the name of Angry Ethel has been immortalised in this portrait discovered rolled up in an urn in the damp recesses of a cave in Pembrokeshire in 1971.

The Story of Beastman-The Journey To The Otherworld

Open publication - Free publishing - More art

A young lass up on the moor has the shock of her life when she bumps into Beastman, legend of the Moor. She is is given the task of getting some shopping for him as he finds it 'hard to discreetly walk the aisles' of a supermarket. Will she return with his shopping and live to tell the tale.....?