During the summer writing retreat in Østerløkke, it blew up, and while the North Sea was in turmoil, Line Fjord wrote about her inner wild North Sea. Ed.

I am an ocean.

Right now, the North Sea itself is roaring inside me. I am the ocean, crashing onto the shore and letting the wave's last elongated movement subside and spread out on the beach like white foam. The latter looks almost gentle, but it is a deception.

There's a gale from the west, and I'm furious.

Not because I am angry with anyone. The rage is savagery that fills me like the force with which the ocean waves roll. They come from a distant place, perhaps Scotland or Normandy, and over time, across the longitudes, have gained so much weight and power that they form a staircase of white teeth outside the beach, where they break in spray and foam.

I am the North Sea. Because inside me I crash through landscapes of fine-grained sand and small dunes. I am the fury, the force that lets churches crash into the sea and hips stand under water, the one that breaks down old borders, floods flimsy fishing huts and tears up rotten sea plants from the bottom.

Today I don't care about the destruction. No coastal defense can hold me back – and I watch with joy as the steepness of the churches tumbles over the slope. I fall on my knees and pray for the tremor of power, I pray for a new coastline, I need the undercurrent and horse holes to reshape me and set me free. Something in me is changing.

But the lighthouses! Even when I am at my greatest strength, I need the lighthouses that light the way. Especially in the dark. They send out melodies of flashes in colors, carefully tuned to seconds and indicated on charts all over the world. Lighthouses are important for sea power, and they must be moved inland to solid ground when the abyss threatens. Because then I, like all ships in the world, can direct my power and set a course.

Rage is my life force.
The rage is my will, my instinct. The shower is my conquest, the wave is my sex, my pen, my roar. The beach is my conquest.

I am the sea. Today I am the North Sea inside.
Outside, I am quiet and sitting here on my pillow in silence in the hall at Østerløkke. While it is blowing outside the window and inside me.

Line Fjord is a journalist and cand.ling.merc in French. She works with communication and language, and has had a regular meditation practice for a number of years with a focus on the intersection between meditation and creative practice. She is interested in relationships and creativity in text, both rooted in the heart.

She receives teaching from Hanneli Ågotsdatter and Peter Høeg and participates in retreats.