When bronzed blades are lost within the pools they always catch my eye. This week they reminded me of the journeys that ‘A New Topography’ is making across land and water.
Hello, and welcome to Spring in the Northeast - it’s now official.
I touched on the shadows that a recent intrusion has thrown last week in The Confidence Trip. This week I’ve been making a conscious effort to reboot (no pun intended) my practice of putting feet and words one in front of the other as I head out into the landscape. This letter is in turn about again noticing; reflecting and thanking you.
Noticing
Friday. A cold rain falls. Travelling north, ploughed fields ooze moisture, the soil darkly sticky. Fields of new molehills resolve themselves into lines ploughed for new afforestation on agricultural land. Is this progress? Afternoon sees a succession of pre-April showers.
Saturday. The sun is unnaturally bright, the sky blue, yet I have to force myself out. The air is chill, the macadam slippery underfoot: frost lingers where the sun has yet to reach. The chorus is joined by visiting gulls. A small brown bird lands on the birch trunk beside me; I have a intimate view of a tree creeper climbing upwards before it realises it has company and flies off.
Continuing between the fingers of broom that grasp an unusually muddy path, I spot two deer fawns lying in the heather and take the top way to avoid disturbing them. I see a third head turn, ears extended. The morning sun filters through the pine; a woodpecker marks time; at high-level a plane rumbles.
I alter my intended route to avoid conversation beyond hello and a short greeting; it’s not a morning I want to share. On the road I step over a headless mouse. The sun now reaches a side of the plantation which is normally dark and cold. There’s a brightness here that I’m not used to; the light has intensified and I feel exposed. A tractor passes with loaded trailer and I wonder at the intent; I’ve grown suspicious of men with machines. I go back to peering through the vegetation, moss, heather, rhododendron, blaeberry, as if I will find answers there.
I spy one hare running, hear two mistle thrush rattling, watch five geese grazing.
Sunday. Overnight rain clouds muffled us and left a mild start. Birds sing sweetly, a score to the film playing in the calm waters of the pond. Green fields await the year’s lambs - soon surely?
Monday. Fattening buds on the osier are backlit silver in the rising sun. Fragments of luminous cloud float by in the breakfast table glass. From frost to 9 degrees by 9am; three buzzards scribe circles high in blue.
Tuesday. The hills have a first flush of olive green amid the patterns of muirburn. Today’s illuminated beauty comes from the extended wings of birds as they negotiate the feeder.
Stepping out after lunch, once the showers have passed, the song marking territory is almost frantic. Again mild, it’s an afternoon to close your eyes as you walk, filtering the brightness of the sun, feeling the breeze wrap around you as it passes.
I eavesdrop on duckly conversations on the track ahead, a mallard drake and two females. The butterbur is in full flower: how easily we dismiss the common, and yet what are we if not widespread? The leaves that we valued in autumn still lie alongside and float in watery potholes.
There is frog spawn and a green and purple ball in the ditch. For the second year running, I’ve arrived after the fact and I miss hearing their amphibious calls.
The wilded snowdrops have not quite finished flowering and the season is hesitant to change gear and enter spring. I stop to watch a wren on the deer fence, a mix of sweet syllables and more familiar scold.
At 6.30pm a bat warms its wings in front of the house.
Wednesday. Wetness again pervades, a briefly watery sun soon disappearing into grey. I set off dry, walk through drizzle that feels soft on my skin, before retreating under hood as it turns to rain. The day is suitably subdued as I come upon a small deer fawn, lying in the corner of the sheep field; without obvious mark it could be sleeping. It seems only right to pause and acknowledge this life lost early. The forecast was misleading, the precipitation intensifies. I swap hood for spruce and wait out the worst, listening to the sound of rain.
Reflecting
In coming to understand this place and my relationship with it I have laid down words. A trickle became a torrent, and for a while the spring seemed to have no limit. In recent weeks the water slipped through cracks that have opened up; there are lines imposed, gouges in the earth, contours altered. Change has brought perturbation; quiet has been supplanted by noise. My carefully arranged layering has been subject to erosion, words lost in weathering an incoming depression. The stream has yet to refind its course and continue around these unwelcome deposits.
With time I’m sure the waters will clear, the sediment settle, the thoughts again coalesce. New words will lend their melody. Nature will regain the imperative, blur the marks, muffle the sounds, soothe the soul; it will take a little time and a degree of forbearance. How many times have we tried to mould this place only for it to break free and continue as before? There are lessons to be learned: watch the moss, its slow spread, its quiet persistence, its steady accretion.
I’m learning that writing is not just a creative act but a way of deepening connection with place. The timing of this realisation has been somewhat unfortunate but we do not have the luxury of chosing the moment.
Activity & Thanks
This week the last copy in the Limited Edition of ‘River’ has gone off to its new home. In a wonderful bit of symmetry it has returned to Derbyshire, where the river is, and to someone who has their own long-standing relationship with water. It feels like a circle completed.
To those of you who have shared your thoughts after receiving ‘A New Topography’ - a special thank you. Your words are especially welcome at the moment and wonderful encouragement.
And to all of you - I love hearing from you, so please don’t be shy.
If you’d like to find out more about ‘A New Topography’ you’ll find full details of this little book here. Perhaps it will encourage you to think about combining words with images.
It occurs to me that not only the words but the pages and books too are sedimentary structures, the result of deposition, compaction and cementation. Hold that thought…
Thank you for joining me and for reading this. Until next week,
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.
Beautiful words and images. Thank you.
Love your book art and thoughts. Thank you for sharing.