1 December 2022

So. The bone-hard knuckle-end of autumn turns to stone- 

hard winter waits snarling in its lair

Yet. The petal-yellow gorse lies soft on my fingers-

 robin chitter-chatters from the hedge

and the bluest sea and sky meet in shimmering hope

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I pick my way over the rocks

more carefully now

than the child I can still hear

behind me

who ran heedlessly

wind and salt in her hair

across the fern-warm

seagull-calling cliffs

Ahead of me

I glimpse the crone

staff in hand

facing the unchanging horizon

a pocketful of mumbles

such are promises...

But for now the present

moment

is wild enough

dog at my feet

is wild enough

I taste with pleasure

the seasalt breeze

as our walk

turns us home

31 July

Blackb'rries in the rain

glowing like promised jewels

the first of the year

Discarded feathers

glinting in my upturned palm

this same shining day

' As I walked out...' 100 word prose-poem

Already the midsummer sun shimmers along the dusty track, my shadow a slender man in faded overalls and a wide-brimmed hat.

I ponder Steinbeck, Laurie Lee and Edward Thomas, for whom all roads led inevitably to France. And Frost, who couldn't persuade him to leave for America, his own two roads in a yellow wood, long he stood...

      The choices we make

       the shape of our walking

       and the roads we take

The day is too hot - my old dog pants beside me, the young one lolloping heedlessly ahead - until relief turns us down the dapple-cool seaward road home

Taraloka haikus June 2022

Cold around my heart

blows the unsuspecting wind -

hold your loved ones close

Tenderly the rain

still my desert heart cries out

for amazement

All my senses stilled

entranced by the dragonfly

glancing on a leaf

Facing the west wind

I breathe the salty air of

my imagination

Still, again we sit

the 'mindfulness of birdsong'

scintillates the air

Disparate pilgrims

beneath the 'shivering' tree*

and the bluest sky.   

(*populus tremula)

Precipitously

my compass-needle judders

then rebalances

How shall I return

scattering tears like raindrops

from this dreaming land

Journey(ing)

Blue blue sea-sky, and silver-flat wetland mirrors then, turning inland , softer-eyed green, and confetti-white blackthorn 

Later a bonfire , burning, and for an instant the redolence of acrid smoke,

brings always the yearning, the glancing, fleeting finger-tip 

of memory

Misty...

Here are just a few pics of the bundle of fun who has burst into our lives this week!

Kitty is, as yet, undecided, but will put up with the shake-up, as did Evie, when Kitty first rocked up!

As you can see from the last pic, I took the shears to Kitty's long dark hair, which was matting, last week - and found a sheep under the wolf's clothing!

organiccotton.biz

I need new sheets for our bed! When I was a child, bedsheets were old, cotton and had been 'sides-to-middled' - you can't do THAT with modern poly-cotton sheets when they wear out in the middle!

So - pure cotton then, and while I'm going there, organic would be good. And fairly traded...

So here we have our very own West Wales organic textile place, in Machynlleth, just down the road!
A lovely wild road-trip, a discount (cos I was nice and visited in person and promised to return for the other sheet), which effectively meant I got the wooden reel of organic cotton thread free...

No, I probably didn't save much from ordering them online from one of the giants, and yes you would have to pay postage, if you don't live over here in the wild west - but check out their website:

organiccotton.biz !

And get inspired...

And yes I do still need to hem the sheet, use it and wash it before going back for another 3metres.

I shall get out my ancient hand-turned Singer sewing-machine - which my mum bought when she was expecting me. In 1954...

Trying to Understand...

...about cults and sects - how they come about, flourish, go rotten from the core like apples - I borrowed a memoir from the local library, and read it, with horrified fascination, in a few days.

Then I read more about the author, and discovered she had written a very highly thought-of novel during our Cambridge days. 

Our library has a pretty rubbish literature section, so I tracked down the novel from my favourite pandemic online second hand bookstore.

It duly arrived a few days ago and I tucked into it this afternoon, wrapped in my bright wool blanket on the sofa.

A chapter or two in I come across a funeral, with hyacinths...and my memory says:

 'you've passed this way before! The funeral is in the autumn, hyacinths don't flower in the autumn. And in the next chapter there is a guinea-pig, in a wheel, keeping the protagonist awake all night (the stuff of nightmares!). And you hurled the book from you, with snorts of contempt for editors...'

So I read on. And there is indeed an accidental giant, nocturnal nightmare guinea-pig...

But this time, I am going to read the whole book - unless I come across a misplaced apostrophe or semi-colon...

The year turns...

Imbolc blessings to you!

Here on the wild west Wales coast the daylight hours are increasing by infinitesimal minutes, bulbs are pushing up their optimistic spears and storms are threatening.

I am feeling hopeful. And trying to make sculpted clay heads...

L to R...alien, neanderthal man, Salvador Dali!

This is proving a challenge - but I am not firing the results, and the clay will be soaked, squodged and recycled. Or should that be re-recycled, as it's already at least once used .

Last of the big spenders, me!...

Fifteen-minute writing exercise day 4

Writing prompt: "Silent Friend of Many Distances"

Wild child unspoken

lost young woman

knowing always there was more than

this bitter misunderstood taste 

of failure

Bell resounding

heart responds

breath deepens as

turning once more inward

I encounter my silent self - 

true one, friend of all the years

Fifteen-minute writing exercise day 3

Writing prompt: "Climbing" by Lucille Clifton

Hungry hands long filled

empty nest long-abandoned,

swimming, calm-floating the drifting currents of desire - 

maybe I should have wanted less?

Well-past the gnarled rope-notch marked 60

braids, if I grow them now

will in truth shine like slated rain

But still the sunshine falls

gold on the silver sea

still the white birds call

and the white stones mark the way

Fifteen-minute writing exercise day 2

Writing prompt: "Blackwater Woods" by Mary Oliver

Ah, familiar words,

these I have quoted

over and over

in the cinnamon and wood-scented rooms of memory

to those faced with the loss

of all we hold most dear -

father, mother, 

child (oh nameless, fathomless horror!)

How CAN I stand before their losses, cries torn from our bodies, and quote her words?

Only bearing compassion in my hand and heart,

All must, when the time comes, be relinquished, and to live our lives now we can only practise

letting go

Fifteen-minute writing exercise day 1

Writing prompt: 'From Blossoms' by Li-Young Lee

Oh to breathe in what we love -

all the impossible

possible

all the blossom-light dapple-dark

of the world

in each inhale

Ah to take wing over

the orchard of the world

soar upwards on the scented air

of  healing

scatter love and light

like bright petals 

as we drift