Words

Words

He wakes up in the early hours
And goes to sit by the window,
Propelled by the dream that woke him.
Words pour onto the page on his desk -
Like marbles in freefall into a pool of clarity,
Released, at last, from their drawstring purse.

In the morning he reads sentences
And wonders who wrote them.

Work in progress. The blob on the right has to go. It looks like a bridge that went wrong in construction. Meant it to look like reflections of the trees...

I have just finished reading Barbara Kingsolver's book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, co-written with her husband and one daughter. They embarked on a one-year trial to see if they could live exclusively on food produced in their own area. Much of it was grown on their own small farm. They managed nicely, enjoying crops when they were harvested, and pickling and canning in August for the coming winter. This really appeals to me, and my mind went into over-drive, planning my new vegetable garden for the new home. Perthshire is a good place to live; we wouldn't have to go without much. Yesterday, in The Sunday Times, there was a small piece about the Fife Diet. A group of 200 - 300 people from Fife are coming to the end of their very similar experiment. The article mentioned a cheese-shop in Anstruther. If you live in Fife, getting hold of lobsters will never be a problem! Have a look at www.fifediet.wordpress.com I downloaded Simon Fairlie's article "Can Britain Feed Itself?" and found it both informative and fascinating. I am now trying to persuade my husband to take up fishing again! But what will I do about olive oil?...

METTE

05/12/58 - 20/11/08

I am off tomorrow morning. Visiting England for the first time since June.

Sleepless

Her sleep flickers throughout the night;
Frets through fear and fragility
Until the first light of morning.

She paints a swan in shades of blue,
Phthalo replaces her loved ones for a while.
Tonight she will ask God to stay in her room,
Hoping she'll know that he's there.

Wherever I go.


Wherever I go, they are with me now;
Four of my close relatives
And my most beloved friend.

Will this be the last embrace?
Do hearts physically break?
When tears mingle - does it make it better?
Or worse?

Each time the phone rings
I steady my voice as I answer.

In the quiet of my morning
Five candles burn brightly
Next to my cup of coffee.
They are with me as I try
To concentrate on reading the news.

They are with me as I measure up
For shelves and choose new carpets.

And when I head for the hills,
To talk with the one who listens,
I wrap them all inside my coat.

...and the leaves that are green turn to brown...

November is here. One of my joys is going to Sheena's painting class at Boltachan Gallery on a Saturday morning. I have no talent whatsoever when it comes to drawing or painting, which is perhaps why I enjoy it so much. When I write I am always very critical of the stories, chapters and poems I produce. Here I just sit down for two hours and have no expectations - I concentrate and fiddle with all the lovely materials in front of me, but it doesn't matter much how it turns out. The gallery is beautiful. The pictures have been re-hung and there is a new theme involving small squares; mainly of animals heads. Sheena brings us delicious coffee and before you know it, time is up. Back home now and my mind is filling up fast with more pressing things.

It is grim.

Well ... you have to go with it...

THE SUN AND THE STARS

I have yet to ski up the mountain side
And for days now the sun has not been seen.
I have circled the mire in man-made tracks
With freezing yoghurt visibility.

This afternoon I sit by the window,
Watching the spot where the mountain should be.
Now is the time - something stirs inside me,
But I haven't long before it gets dark.

A few moments later the wind whips away
Long sections of thick milky shroud.
I lace up my boots and step outside
And see promise written all over the sky.

Time being rationed; I go up the steep path,
Warming up quickly, still protected by trees.
When all I can hear is my intake of breath,
I close my mouth, the air is too cold.

I stop in my tracks when I've passed the treetops,
At once I know this day will stay with me.
I glide across the mountain side
Through powdered silver ridges,
Towards the disc of platinum, setting in the west.
It shines through a sheerness of grey
And I'm flanked by a thousand diamonds,
Sparkling on the crests of this Winter Sahara's dunes.

"Thank you stars," I whisper, "I am watching you."
A thousand voices whisper back: "We are watching you."

Today is our 30th wedding anniversary. This is the official photograph.

There is snow on Ben Lawers this morning! First of the season.

CUSP

The wind whispered gently through September.
I was given calm reflections and thoughts,
Watching the loch in afternoon sunshine.
I was given glowing evenings outdoors
Together with sons here on borrowed time.
For their days belong to other countries.
September is still so recent.
I hold on to their presence, though they are not here,
But light the fire now before it gets dark.
The wind whips through the October landscape.

Sunshine after the shower. It is time now, I think, to move the citronella candle indoors. Autumn is definitely here and the candle doesn't help to protect against midges anyway. The only product that works here is Avon's Skin-So-Soft. It doesn't score highly on the nice-fragrance scale, though. Citronella does.

Today sees The Colin McRae Forest Stages, part of the Scottish Rally Championship 2008. McRae died a year ago and this is a memorial. Drummond Hill was one of his favourite places. Stupidly, I didn't go up towards Schiehallion today with our Berkshire visitors. I thought I'd leave them to get on with some male bonding, while I had a quiet day here at home. It isn't quiet. These cars could all do with having their exhaust systems checked! Part of the rally takes place on public road. I took this photo when I picked up courage to go and pick up my paper. The dog is fretting. The sheep on Drummond Hill are nowhere to be seen. I wonder where they hide. Many of the big names in the world of rally are paying tribute today and it is an important date in the racing calendar. It is fine by me. I am doing the crossword and look forward to tomorrow when I can snoop around in artists' studios. (Open Studios in Pertshire this coming week.)

Chop some onions and cloves of garlic, then let them sweat in olive oil while you think about what you will have for dinner, sipping from a glass of wine...

This is how many meals started out, many years ago now, in the south of France. It became a Pavlov's Dogs Thing. Summer after summer. My friend from Oxfordshire and I - sitting by a well-used chopping-board. Out came the onions. Out came the wine. One summer in particular springs to mind. Our cars had arrived, complete with suitcases, husbands and offspring (all male). Our task at this stage was to unpack and stock up on onions. The wine was literally on tap. We stayed on a vineyard and wine was delivered personally by Monsieur F whenever we felt we needed some. His housekeeper was Moroccan and she had many, many children. All boys. The entertainment was a given. A fortnight of football matches. England v Morocco. Cultural activities were few and far between.

Having smelled autumn yesterday - real authentic autumn - today Perthshire has been basking in warm sunshine from a cloudless sky. I set off to re-stock the kitchen (Patrick was here last week), first at the vegetable and egg farm in Logierait, then at the Co-op in Pitlochry. Arriving back home in the late afternoon it felt just like those days in France. I opened a good bottle of chilled white, chopped some onions and thought about what to do next. Summer arrived in Scotland on the 22nd of September.

It has been a wonderfully warm and sunny day. I have spent it washing sheets and towels after the last spell of visitors. John has watched his team lose to Aston Villa on TV. We set off for an afternoon walk on Drummond Hill just a little too late in the day. By now it was grey and felt slightly melancholy. Drummond Hill was the Forestry Commission's first plantation. Timber was needed after the first world war. The bracken is turning rusty, but we saw a deer, several squirrels and this single sprig of heather. You can smell autumn...

Approaching Linne Bheag (Gaelic for small patch of water) in Anstruther this morning. A rewarding day in many ways.

Blue Glass

Heat

Her kitchen faced north - a haven in the heat.
The door to outside stood ajar
And you could hear the wind moving through the trees.

She spent much time in here, my Grandmother.
When the men folk played boccia on a pine needle carpet,
Amusing themselves in the forest's shade,
She cooked their lunch and entertained me.

We laid out the table in the dining room
And it was here that my love-affair
With blue glass first began.

In the afternoon she ran cold water
From the pump over my wrists
And gave me the end piece of a cucumber to eat.
We pretended it was ice-cream.

The swing-seat was filled with tie-less men.
Braces over white shirts and rolled-up sleeves.
They sipped cognac with Vichy water from tall glasses
And told tall stories,
As we washed up blue glasses for the evening meal.
My Grandmother and I.

An Stuc

This shows the village of Lawers on the far shore, where you will find a restaurant with an imaginative menu and very reasonable prices. The Munro in the background (the one with the steepest slope) is called An Stuc. It was here that a close family member struggled the day he climbed four Munros in one go. It is fast becoming a legend - how he got stuck on An Stuc.



There are so many talented artists in this neck of the woods, and no shortage of good galleries either. One of the very best opened last month - Boltachan Gallery: www.boltachangallery.co.uk
There is a good article in a local paper in connection with the opening: www.commentonline.co.uk/art-media-craft/BoltachanGalleryLaunch.htm

Loch Tay in the late afternoon

The days are getting shorter and I eat my breakfast by candle-light now. Dinner too. Yesterday was promising to be one of the last days of summer and we set off to Oban to have lunch in the harbour. Full daylight! I bought seafood from the fishmonger, who kindly packed it in ice for the return journey. We drove home, using the quieter road hugging the south shore of Loch Tay, and were rewarded by this mellow, late afternoon landscape. Once back I cooked some of the langoustine tails (the Swedish way, I still have some dill outside) and put the rest of my purchases in the freezer. Then lit the candles. A 150-mile round-trip to buy fish is nagging my environmental conscience. It was so very good for mind and body though...

Scottish Native Woods are working in the area this autumn. You might want to follow their progress on http://taywesterncatchments.blogspot.com

The Rosslyn Chapel. Not looking like I had expected it to look. It stands under a canopy to enable dry conditions for the restoration. That book will have helped the funding! £7.50 and people queuing up.

Alex (in the centre) was here!!!

Come in, sit down, please take a seat,
Not here - there by the fire.
You didn't come here for the heat?
If so, this will be dire.

The wind is howling down the Glen,
But, hey, the view is great.
Why don't you go and climb the Ben
While I expectorate?

Forget the heat they have in France,
Who wants to sit and read
Beneath the plane trees in a trance
And watch the poppies seed?

Or hang around in dappled shade
Whilst sipping from one's glass,
Just checking if the wine they made
Excels within its class?

No - who wants that when you can watch
The rivers filling up
With rain in Scotland - have a Scotch -
Go pick a buttercup.

It's August now and warm today,
Three layers will suffice.
Be careful now with what you say
To locals - sound advice!

It's loch of course, it's not called lake,
And burn's the word for brook.
Your reputation is at stake -
A disapproving look

Will certainly appear when they
Hear loch pronounced as lock.
Should you not grasp just what they say,
Then smile and mumble "och".

But chances are that you won't see
A single soul at all.
You'll trek alone and feel so free,
Your troubles will seem small.

It's dreich, it's damp, but you won't care,
For standing there you'll see
Blaeberries, heather and a hare
You'll come back and tell me?

I dedicate this ballad to my husband, who normally doesn't pay any attention at all to my rhyming exercises, or any other of my attempts to write poetry, but on this occasion helped me out with the fourth line of the second stanza.

Touching base

I SAY COURGETTE AND YOU SAY ZUCCHINI

I can think of one or two things that I'd rather do than to bake.
This morning it seems I have little choice; The Guild has a sale
and the in-laws will come from Dumfries.

I open the fridge door and I am amazed how it sparkles in here.
(The in-laws will come from Dumfries.)
With what will I bake?
Five beautiful small courgettes? Yes, with five beautiful courgettes.

I know exactly where it is,
although I have not used it for many years,
your typed recipe for Zucchini Bread.

And as I measure American Cups of grated courgettes
I remember your house in Yattendon. England's Peace.
Where you chose to live instead of "in-house"
at the air-base on Greenham Common.

As I whisk eggs with sugar and add oil
I remember your young children, and mine,
in the village school. Your JJ's nativity shepherd:
"Hey guys! Have ya seen that star?!!"

In goes the flour, mixed with soda and cinnamon,
and I think of your husband pruning roses
in the garden of England's Peace - with his chainsaw.

Chopped nuts. Us with the boys at Windsor Safari Park,
watching the dolphins outwit their keepers.

As the cake goes into the oven I think of how we both left our Agas behind.
How our lives interwove for just a few years. Two decades ago.
We are now to be found on mountain sides, near rivers, separated by an ocean.
It is time perhaps that one of us crossed it...

If I knew you were coming I would bake a cake.

Escaped all duties this morning and climbed these. Spent three hours on the mountain side. Simply wonderful. Not too hot, not too cold. Had coffee from my flask overlooking Loch Tummel. Blue around the mouth, many blaeberries up here. Back in the kitchen now, cleaning out the fridge and wiping down the cooker. In case anyone is interested...

THE LYON

It has rained for several days and the water looks very brown.
A pleasant afternoon walk along the river.

THE SWALLOWS


This year they took their time to get going.
Frantic activity waited until June.
We worried when scaffolding went up
About disruptions to family life,
But the young's supply of flies continued.

I counted thirty-five of them today,
Assembled on a wire against blue sky.
Gone are the fluffy feathers.
Their tails have lengthened and now they can fly.
The scaffolding - a blessing in disguise;
It was really the foundation of a flying school.
We tried to focus on tennis at Wimbledon,
But found ourselves watching their progress.

Graduates of The Coshieville Flying School,
They soar and dip, swoop, race and twirl,
As we wait for the window-cleaner to return.

FAITH

Down by the sea shore on shellpowdered sand,
Is where you will find her, walking and thinking.
Sometimes, not always, there's an outstretched hand,
The one that guides and prevents her from sinking.
Solitude days tie a string of fine pearls,
Each precious one she presents to the light.
But depths, doubts and downturns when everything swirls,
When she's locked up inside her in darkness of night.
There are footprints - someone has found her beach.
She stands in the shallows, listens to the sea,
And touched by the wind she is now within reach;
She hears the words clearly "Come follow me".
Down by the sea shore compassion rolls in
From the timeless ocean and the voice within.

SCOTLAND

Corncrakes and snowflakes and dragonfly wings,
Forests and rivers and stretches of sand.
Swallows and curlews and hurricane winds,
Artists and poets and arable land.

Rainfall and bracken and ptarmigan trails,
Gift shops and tartan and bagpipe parades.
Buntings and eagles and sounds filled with sails,
Hawthorn and hoar frost and daylights that fades.

Moonlight and moorland and red morning glow,
Castles and cafes and Ossian's cave.
Otters and red deer and deep drifts of snow,
Mountains and gem stones and moments to save.