THE NORTH RIDING PROJECT

The air was heavy with St Mark’s flies: shiny, black and about a half-inch long, feeding on cow-parsley flowers.  They are top-heavy insects, with a thorax like an old Dragon Rapide biplane and a body that tapers to nothing.  Their flight is jerky and uncertain.  They kept taking off like Blériot on a maiden flight, dropping out of the sky quite suddenly, only catch themselves, as if on an invisible safety net, and set some new and equally aimless course.

Deakin/Waterlog