crescendo and chaos. the sea is a brute flung up, then smashed down… the froth of pummel and turmoil bedlam. brouhaha. beneath this late afternoon winters light the sea, she is cajoled then threatened…sister moon, brother wind. snarl volatile… ever the scientist… pour energy into any system, the outcome: BRoiL then fRENZy! shout into the wind, these your desires and fears….my heart, some sea thing child
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super invigourating! and most deffo not for swimming in today futile feeble to wave either a mobile phone or these few words! but hey, always we do… an urge to share… testament, to bear witness, to immensity back to bed, a long dreary convalescence… audiobooks, chocolate and bollywood! mellow twixtmas one and all x
‘ha, ha, ha’ (huge booming infectious laughter) ‘i LOVE being loved!’… just listened to desmond tutus desert island discs, immense moral integrity, such a warm engaging character, the cadence of his voice… plus with a ‘desmond’ he even has a level of degree named after him… unique. RIP
leaf kerfuffle! brown, dowdy but exultant… myriad hued… the autumnal tumble, a last leaf hurrah scampering about the beech wood, like an exuberant puppy… i caught so so many leaves!… each a wish… one for you hmmm.. catching leaves should be a ceremonial process… a druidic serenade? station yourself, slightly downwind, of the oldest most majestic beech spirit within the woods begin the invocation with a bout of strenous whistling… i favour ‘i am the lord of the dance said he’… place one finger, folk singer style in ear, a la Euan McColl… other hand should nestle, nonchalant, in pocket ‘O mighty Beech, begin the gyre, release your leaves of burnished copper!’… the more operatic the better (always!?) a wind, weary sweeps through the canopy… the leaves begin their fall some proceed with orderly haste, others pirrhouette, loop da loop, a melodramatic swan song focus on one, far aloft, leaf summoner, leaf stalker… feel the quiver as it acknowledges the beckon of gravity down, down it plummets… pounce! a lunge forward, a frenzy of grasp and clutch, the leaf tickles the fingers, then pancake follops over and … ‘BUNDLE’ chucks itself onto the dingy pile of leaf husks on the ground below Dratt! but then, unheralded, another leaf, slaps against my forehead… bill stickering into place… i gently peel it off, cheerfully whooping ‘caught one’ aw people, them PEOPLE, make such a fuss about intention! but half the knack is just to acknowledge, have gratitude for, good fortune when we accidentally blunder stumble over it? oops i’ve gone all Mills and Boon meets the Beano! anyway, not the easiest of seasons, stodge despondency and despair… thought i’d written something wise in my morning pages… but it remains an indecipherable scrawl! ………. these eclipse hours… schumann resonance? hathor frequency? stand beneath the trees… respond with stillness… feel the frequency… strident but calm… the one ringing clarion note that underpins being. bliss
Diwali New Moon Blessings! light a candle and welcome Sri Lakshmi, Goddess of Prosperity, Beauty and Power she sits on a pink lotus flower, golden coins endlessly pouring from the vase at her lap, heralded, nay trumpeted, by a pair of white elephants… beauty and abundance One of the seasons great fire festivals, hey, nearly the cheerful bedlam of Lewes and the 5th! not my spiritual tradition? well, true, but auspicious to acknowledge the goddess in this bountiful, benign form… gold and pink, pink and gold the main pic is an impromptu, but long standing (3 years), mini shrine plonked down at one end of the dining table… my daughter came back from india, a gift of the sticker, a mini buddha and tibetan prayer flags i leaned lakshmi against a jar full of old pound coins, next to a holey hag stone from the beach and, yep, choula hot sauce(!)… things tend to flotsam wash up in my life, often to stay
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this morning, up early, a beautiful golden light, a sky of profound blue… so to pedal down to the beach for the first proper winter swim of the year a calm cold ocean, after the recent turbulence of storms. air which nips! those smoke plumes from the lips… yet a sun replesdent with majesty and warmth floating on my back, looking shorewards, heave of sea, burnished gold, dappled squirm of liquid, the colour a reflection from the sand honey cliffs above after, see-ee-the of sea as it sucks back through the plenitude of pebbles, eye follows the snake writhe of wave along the shoreline this trickster mind, thoughts struggle with the clamour… qualm, hunger, scarcity… yet, ha, we dwell midst might, mystery and … a glut of profound abundance! lakshmi in sussex! preposterous? yet sipping my flask of Rose petal tea, pondering out to sea… reflect on the myth of her birth… gods and demons tug of war churning the sea of ambrosia, lakshmi arising full formed, beautiful from the waves the birth of venus, likewise emerging from shell and the sea… lawks with sun sign, mercury and venus, all in cancer, i’m bound to be somewhat curious of the ocean at pompeii, astonishingly, they discovered a statue of lakshmi, the Romans traded with India, academics postulate on a syncretic Venus-Lakshmi cult… Romano-Celts on pebble sussex beaches deffo nuff waffle! oh and dratt, i never even got around to diwali in mysore in the late 80’s
The Attenborough is from hove lawns… lots of postman paste ups on the yellow bins, many fitting the rigid gold and pink hegemony
As a nerd youth (quelle suprise) i was intrigued by Alexander the Great… obviously by dint of brute conquest, such the mores of teh ancient world… but imagine an empire that, just about, spanned vedic india to ancient egypt!! knowledge fusion of the highest order… there are statues of buddha sculpted in a classical greek style! i’d probs have been a temple dancer tho
hewn…. taciturn… part chunky Knitware, part Rock… all troll post lunchtime swim, i’ve recently succumbed to the ubiquitous cold, that snot phelgm lurgy, so haven’t been in for a few weeks… the water remains disappointingly balmy… but crikey, flayed by the wind afterwards autumnal exhaustion everywhere, so its been a blessing just to be able to loaf about entertained by my bleak, elemental, pudge eyed gruff-ness… see, i don’t only play the Romantic Hero
Rhona: Guapo!
ha! indeed, could, possibly, only be more guapo with an icicle hanging from the end of my nose xx
toes!… what are they actually good for!? counting stuff when we run out of fingers turning the bath taps on, adding warmth, when too lazy to stir from our wallow slumbers oh they are just so blooming far away!…. i in my lofty eyrie… but hey, thats just the megalomania of head thunk close the eyes, shut those peepers, allow consciousness to sediment settle grounded move one toe at a time, feel the involuntary flinch, a spasm elsewhere in the body… else the grip and relentless puppeteering of the jaw feet are so connected ode to toes, odour of toes! what i really like about them is the reminder that once we were different, that upended we clung to branches, cheerful reversal that we peeled fruit, picked nits and our noses with them… the monkey that forgot to dangle yes, a reminder that we were different, but also that we need not, indeed will not, always be the same… toes, time and tide keep turning …………. reflexology… i haven’t received any in years! the hands off of covid a golden age, when i could guarantee that at least one friend a year was training in either massage or reflexology… miss dat wriggle them toes. riddle them toes. clay, the squidge between, on the self build an earthship course … more incoherent muttering… this little piggy went to market, this little piggy stayed at home, this little piggy had veggie sausages….
feet wings! a little bit odlaw, a lot Roald Dali! x
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