VOTE! i just have (signalling virtue), green of course, currently not interested in any other narratives… be warned, don’t expect a benign outcome… i was nearly bowled over by a stampede of drear old people up at the hillcrest… well, older than me anyway amd tho i could not ascertain their intentions, and indeed many of them were after the last remaining currant bun and tickets to the next tea dance, it does not bode well yes lives are busy, but seriously, find time and vote! … and in homage to the grey, here are 2 stereoscopic pics of ‘not the moon’ … queens park last weekend (i’m a-living in the past!) and saturdays brekkie, scoffing the fickle yum of the moon x
hawthorn afternoon! with little or no forethought ended up gathering some of the beautiful blossoms for the annual tincture do it now! a post mostly to remind you thus! they’ll be gawn in less than a week… i love the hawthorn, flower of aphrodite, queen of the may such an opulent pungent pong, huge armfulls of the stuff, all sprawled across the kitchen table sure theres lots of proper info out there, don’t listen to me, but what i do: gather the flowers and some of the freshest tenderest leaves lob in a big jar, pack down with a wooden spoon, then liberally douse with a litre of lidls finest (cheapest) Wodka… a prayer then toast to the goddess, finally store in a dark cupboard thats it! after about a month remember to take it out, mash squeeze out all the goodness… muslin should be involved, but lawks knows where you get that from?! in the autumn bung in some haws (the small Rosehip like fruit) to help ramp up the hawthorn-y-ness it ends up as a rubicund brown, sometimes sludgy, liquid… i keep it in the fridge, super good for the heart! throughout the autumn and winter start each day with a swig straight from the bottle should imagine its supposed to be only a few drops? but wheres the fun in that? x
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grammar pedant-ry mz mole… tho this image gives me the creeps… first time i read one fish two fish to Finn when he was a nipper, got an eek flashback turning to this page didn’t actually remember the image or anything, but knew that i’d read it as a kid, and not been in a very emotionally buoyant space at the time… books are powerful incantatory spells, sometimes there to unlock what is best left buried deep all from a cheerful post about hawthorn! lummee eck! xx
voted… despite its peculiar idiosyncrasies it remains a right, privilege and responsibility i forgot my reading glasses, but through the fog believe i managed to answer correctly still just about time… thanks to all on here who reminded me! x
the balm of a beltane eve, midst late dappled sunshine, a meander up the cliffs
conk nuzzled midst apple blossom, wealth of aroma, me and da bumble bee!
as an aside, i love saying the word bumble bee! lolls around the tongue, like a fine golden brandy left oer’long in the cask – bomMmmble bee, bbumble breee
i keep on wanting to break out in bass tuned ‘per rappa pum poms’… omms and apple francophone pommes i guess?
I love the fact that this tree has grown from a casually tossed aside apple core, yesterdays picnic, todays majestic…
none of the ‘sturdy root stock, specially grafted fruit bearing cultivar’ palaver, just nature doing her thing
all abouts the intricate babble of birdsong, flit of gold finch, warble of thrush, the playful jostle of a family of sparrows
all the rest of the hillside is awash with hawthorns, froth blossom just about to burst out, the flower of the may
both the apple and the hawthorn are, of course, members of the Rose family, the rule of the 5 petaled flower, forever sacred to venus
the hawthorn tho is the somewhat spiky, rough and tumble, tousle haired, scraped knees, tom boy cousin… i love the wild, crazy charm of the hawthorn
tomorrow? next week, i shall go forth to gather the flowers for my annual tincture… good for the heart dontcha know!
something in me churlishly wants to disregard the apple, too abundant, too gawdamn obviously pretty
but then you come upon the blessing of her in blossom, blush pink and white flowers, fresh green leaves, the colours a summoning, and also a softening of the heart chakra
amongst the apple blossom we are in the presence of the maiden, enchanted, fall to one knee, with the sweetest of smiles, offer up, be happy
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higher up, looking out to sea, a paraglider stitches a line along the edge of the cliffs, blindly feeling out the uprush of thermals
the colours tho remind me that this morning, before a swim, i’d been up here again, watching my first swallow of the year
hurtle appearing from seemingly nowhere, red cap, white flash, the nigh time blue of plumage, his distinctive swoop and weave
the thrill of a gabbling breakneck speed… speaking of nowt but beauty and joy
happy beltane
Nothing to see here (yet!). he sows seeds by the sea shore… A few days before the full moon is apparently a good time to sow for many seeds… Sheer chance and never planning in my case!
Which way up??? flummoxed with first born, which is every father, and possibly parent, ever! What we have to take them home? from the 90’s trove… Finn looking super cute, certainly wouldn’t be hoiking the lummox around like that nowadays… not with me lumbago! …. n.b always presumed lumbago was some sort of beano disease? hoping nobody actually suffers from it, whatever it be
… apropos of nothing, i do adore that phrase! Howard Jones!! sure there are some fans of early 80’s soft electro synth pop out there (mbe 1)… with bonus mime artiste? i was picking up mum from heathrow very early this morning, popped to the loo and this song was billowing about the bogs there was a dubious haunting air to the tune, sounded like it was being played on a casio tone? which led me to suspect that actually it was live Howard Jones has been stuck in the khazi at the airport since mid 83? hence explaining his complete disappearance from the face of the planet
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commenting on my own comment… ancient anecdote… i am reminded of once upon a time hitch hiking through Deutschland, somewhere near Bayreuth, Wagner Götterdämmerung! i was stuck overnight at a motorway service station, zilch lifts, going nowhere… it was freezing cold, so i had to traipse inside, ended up trying to kip sitting on one of the toilets bland piped pop music all night long, bleaggh, woken from my semi slumbers, by the thunderous farts of germanic truck drivers in the cubicle next door, all accompanied by Wham cheerfully warbling ‘Wake me up before you go go go’
R.I.P Rest In Pieces. Macklemore the Sycamore I killed a tree this morning, not said with bravado and aplomb… and despite the obvious comedy (it’s Facebook)… a fair amount of remorse and guilt broadly it’s a small backyard, he would have grown far far too large, wrong tree/wrong place if i’d left it a few more weeks, the leaves would have come out and it would have been impossible I should imagine the time to chop a tree is autumn when the sap is falling? spring is a terrible season, but at least if you squint you can pretend its still a half dead stick stuck in the ground as penance i hand sawed him into small chunks, will season for a year or so then find a suitable wood burner. anyone need some lumber for a viking ship burial? Should imagine the stump will grow back, but, sigh, will deal with that then I had a good ponder before i began and gave him a fare thee well hug Not wishing to be too sentimental, I appreciate that my mere existence on the planet in this society will have decimated i don’t know… a small copse? an area of the Amazonian Rain Forest one thousandth of the size of Wales? (one Wales is the standard unit of measurement for amazonia, plus its St Davids day!) in younger days i also personally hacked many a wilderness in my folks garden but the point is, Macklemores decimation was all so unnecessary! as a good mawkish victorian moralist, i know the time to chop him was the first year uprooting a teensy sapling is nothing, chopping down a 5 or 6 year old tree, a much harsher deal but of course the first few years i took the Romantic Poetic approach, ‘look how can a tree grow there?’ the next couple of seasons it was sloth, depression and busy-ness… and the last 2 years its been ‘oh no i have to kill a tree’ basically, framed as a bellocian cautionary tale deal with your stuff before it gets too big… otherwise ‘James James Morrison Morrison Weatherby George Dupree’ oh not him you know the the one who wandered into a lion cage and died from eating bits of string?? Carpe Diem… I can never remember does that mean ‘sieze the nettle’ or ‘snog a trout’? both. do it. now
gawd, yet another suspiciously glorious day, here at the usual dreg end of February, wishing ya all well on it! i’m bizarrely compelled to post yet more snaps! apols, not imagining they’re particularly fantastic, will return to 1000 stanza gobbledy gook poems, else slomach back into the bliss of silence soon, ha think i’ve taken more pics over the last few days than i did in my first 30 years… which is an utter shame like most peeps i’m profoundly ambivalent about technology, but having a camera on a smart phone, that’s fun and engrossing on with stuff!
pink man in pink larder… paints… green man in green larder everyday dalliance with dali… so easy surrealism! nary finished yet, but thinking so glorious the sunshine, i should go to the beach for a little bit
did make it down the beach for a swim, 4th of the year (5 inc christmas) not that often, but always a thrill the secret is to choose a day when theres little wind as its when you get out that it eats you the sun was astonishingly, almost worryingly, warm… i dried off in plein air, just a woolly bobble hat and unsoggy skimpies, sunbathing promptly fell asleep as for sorting the larder… i started off just looking for the fresh coffee, couldn’t find it… got carried away astonishing how much stubborn crap accumulates… found stuff buried deep deep i hadn’t seen in 8 years… had been wondering where the jewell encrusted mask of tutankhumun had gone too!
