I’m deep in words at the moment, completing articles, researching new interviews for On Landscape and working on a final piece of writing for The Word which I know will add to this conversation with place, and begin a journey towards a collection of writing in some form.
So this week’s read is more concise, drawing on yesterday’s walk. We don’t always have time for a long read - or write - so I’m aiming for short and sweet like yesterday’s sunshine. The afternoon proved so vivid that it sent my initial draft off the pitch to the substitutes’ bench; in Scotland you should never miss any opportunity to reference football!
The night safe’s deposit is white and crystalline. The morning sees further flurries; the afternoon becomes blue but biting. A cold wind slices between the pine in the wood, rising ground offered up like cake dusted with icing sugar. The soundtrack too is sweet with a woodpecker adding bass to the treble of birdsong; the sun is now bright enough to both hint at spring and dazzle the eyes. Shadows are emboldened.
Water levels are high after Monday’s downpour; ditches still run over and a favourite area of birch is flooded, each shining metallic trunk punctuating the new mere. Last night was cold enough for a skin of ice to form across the whole surface and much remains intact, ghosted white by a skim coat of snow. This fragile skin is in places hinting at a slow subsidence, canting at erratic angles as individual trees become new islands.
The ice is assaulted on all sides: burnt back by sun to bird blue water, left suspended on heather, lined by stress. It creaks and occasionally cracks as a slow thaw walks the thinnest places.
It’s hard to imagine this fragile thing shaping the valley, yet the glaciers passed here three times and their subsurface streams and spewing spilling rivers left braided depositions that can still be traced in a rolling, fluid, landscape.
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You’ll find more image rich writing in previous posts on FLOW’s home page. My photography and mixed media art live here on my website.
Transported to Scotland form hot and humid north east coast NSW Australia.
What beautiful images and words from your walk. I can feel the sunshine cutting through the cold.