Sometimes the landscape enthrals me.
Over the weekend, a chilly walk down by the Severn resulted in my finding a small landslide, where the under-cliff below St Peters Church in Newnham had released a few slabs of marl and clay mudrocks down into the soggy riverbank below. Two early-18th-century accounts of the church recall how the ancient spire church standing by the Nab’s end was taken down for fear that it should fall, because the earth around its foundations was being washed away; one account says that the old materials were used to build the little church at the south end of the town. (ref)
I was fascinated by the fleshiness of the rocks, the red river clay looks like blood corpuscles, the ivy traces like veins. The cold air sliced into my lungs.
This morning I awoke in my friends house at 5am o see the red sky glowing behind May Hill. It is the 1st May, Beltane, and it intrigued me that it looked so peaceful and calm in the early morning light, whilst, on the radio, I heard that there was much merriment and orris dancing going on, as well as scrumpy drinking. Urgh, 5am drinking is not for me, far lovelier to view the stately tree cluster that sits like a bun on a hill.
Driving home at 6am the radio was ringing with many pop songs about sun and new day etc. The Beatles clinched it for me.
Carolyn Black 