Author: basgallop

solstice blessings one and all… outside all is drizzle dark, yet trust, the leap of faith, that the sun will return, bringing the balm of warmth, light, life…
season of quietitude
feeling the gentle Rose Quartz Heart Chakra vibes, pink and purple, compassion, light a candle for all who have gone, that which has passed and that which must fall away… one day it will be our turn, be easy and kind xx

cooped up and depleted with the ubiquitous snuffles, the solace of telly… i’ve been watching university challenge, shouting answers out, frequently wrong, but suprisingly often correct, contenting myself with the curmudgeonly old folks tut ‘students of today, do they teach them nothing?!’
oh and watching endless episodes of a colombian teen witch saga… its tosh obvs, but i love the glossiness, the colours, cartagena looking sumptuous, memories from long ago… and the soft bamboozle of latin american spanish

Sarah: Good Solstice
Such an atmospheric time of year
Old site of stone circle on moor behind our house and you can see why it’s there- clear view over the hills to east and west for miles

Wow! Sounds amazing, great place to soak up the ancient and eternal returning vibes… tho presume youve dug it over with your archaeology trowel?! X

Mad Hatter and Cheshire Cat! part of the Alice in Wonderland raft posse
That slightly odd frisson when you randomly bump into a blown up image of yourselves, down on the promenade by the i360…
a beautiful meander at sunset amidst starling murmurations
…………….
that pic has a weird afterlife, echoes of summer on a freezing brighton day, 4 years or so ago now, but it crops up often! was in the Brighton Calendar last year

old skool… tinsel porridge breakfast rave
don’t mess with your food, poddigge went cold with all my banana bling-ing… so had to reheat
ended up being more sesame street elmo, bert n’ ernie than the intended ‘porridge with the prodigy’ x

nelisa: 😂🤣 You’re such a legend Richard!

martin: Poet and now alternative, beat chef?! 😄

Psytrance porridge is so last week, everyone knows Saturday mornings it’s reggae veggie sausages!

Cobweb Santa Beard, with icicle on the end of me nose!… up in Surrey at mums earlier
‘Colder than a well diggers arse’, as Tom Waits memorably sang… so I’ve been doing the usual… sea swimming in me skimpies….
followed by forever and forever in a sauna… gorging on mince pies and mulled-ness (almost mindfullness!) whilst watching footie.
Stay in bed beautiful people! xx

Stop start in a blizzard slo mo motorway… somewhere near Gatwick… fraught and beautiful… even then, I so love the snow

Not this one, but rather partial to a bit of boho schmaltz x

Look! Hoofprints of the giant wooly carretpillar-o-saurus! My foot to scale
Long believed extinct, it endures, in small enclaves on the chalk cliffs of the south downs…
This lovelorn sole survivor seemingly subsists on a diet of new born stoats and Worcestershire sauce flavoured crisps…
I have long suspected it to be my totemic spirit animal?

people of soup! in these far northern lands huddle close around the cauldron of plenty, gather for stories, yarns of yawn and yore
basgallop models leek and potato, knitwear, with a slight hint of shamanic reindeer wee
………………
one more crumb for the mountain of futility that is your facebook feed… if its anything like mine anyway
realised this morning that all my stock cubes expired in 2017, so ‘borrowed’ some swiss vegetable bouillon from daughter
yum!

these the last days of leaf fall, this autumnal hurrah
crimson, mustard, saffron, all of the motley browns
a few beeches remain full burnished, stuck over with gold, vivid against the clear blue sky beyond
sucked of moisture, skeletons of nowt but tannin and rasp
breeze stirred, one leaf detaches, it begins with a waggle, a saunter,
the swoop of leaf fandango,
a final bellyflop swoon to the ground
letting go? giving up! oh you leaf shirkers
the wind strengthens, a brittle leaf rattle (something of teeth chatter), a swirl, bask and laugh within this blizzard snow shaker
beneath foot, the leaf kerfuffle, layered, interleaved, humus settling to mud

the earth serpent, coils of body, she rears up, then dives deep beneath the ground,
sloughing off the colours, the beauty, of her myriad scales
a great sinuous wave flowing through the land, but also, passing through us
we are buoyed, immense, lifted up
then left, the promise of return, yet bereft in the still serenity of ourselves

……………….

chewed through a whole biro trying to write those words! i am an inveterate pen gnaw-er, especially when words don’t want to flow (stuckness mostly a winter thing)
fun to write similar words each turn around the sun, a return, spiraling through the year
it doesn’t have to be great, just a really enjoyable process, stodgily working things through
was trying for something a bit more ooh i don’t know manley hopkins or o’donohue this time
recently, when i’ve been waking at a blear 4:00 am, to get back to sleep i’ve been listening again to o’donohue (‘beauty: the invisible embrace’)
i love his irish voice, that slightly peculiar intonation, it flows beautifully with his words, to my pre dawn consciousness muddled mind, i’m not always sure what he’s saying
but its important, a sumptuous crescendo of lyricism

‘Freed from desire, mind and senses purified’
i’ve been rolling these words around on my tongue all day long, like some buddhist koan pebble gobstopper
i’m rubbish at equinamity, just too darn difficult… so with some relief finally realised that this owl pellet of wisdom isn’t from thich naht hahn,
but rather a cheesey dance song that came up on this mornings jog, it continues:
‘My love has got no power, he’s got his trampoline! my love has got no money, he’s got his trampoline!’, sentiments i can definitely get bounce behind

the certain knowledge that November is not for me… its all being reclusive, chunky knitwear and glum soup
the endless twilight tho is quite beautiful
colours of washed out lemon, with a flame aura of blue through violet
black clouds like scattered ash, lit from below, feather bellied, swollen, solemn, ponderous
indeed, nuage et nuance

katie: Love it! And my love has got his strong beliefs (and hopefully a strong trampoline too)

truth! whatever lyrical quibbles its deffo an earworm… listened to it again, now its going around my head, probs till christmas day xx

lou: Yesssss this song is epic  November live to your dear 

magda: Na na na na na na naaana na naaana na na

harley: na na na na na nah-nah na na na na nana!

genius! i think they realised that the words they had were perfection in themselves, so decided not to bother making up any more xx

hey jude for the dance generation