The Stranger

                                                            The Stranger

                                                                      Kookaburra

Dear Reader,

A kookaburra has been spotted living wild in the Suffolk countryside.  The bird which is a member of the kingfisher family, is native to Australia and is an unusual sight in the UK.  Apparently it has been here for about nine years and has made itself at home.

In favourable conditions kookaburras can live for more than 20 years and have the same partner for life. As small carnivores, kookaburras play an integral role in the ecosystem by controlling small animal populations.

The kookaburra holds significant cultural and mythological importance particularly in indigenous Australian traditions.  Revered as a sacred and powerful creature the kookaburra is often associated with creation stories and spiritual beliefs.

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The poem today I wrote having visited my mother in hospital. I noticed the woman in the next bed was very ill, dying in fact, and not a person attending her.  I held her hand until someone came but I was very shocked and upset.  Gosh I hope my family will be with me when my turn comes.

                                                                                      *

From Francis Kilvert  February 24th  1870  in Radnorshhire

'The Black Mountains lighted up grandly, all the furrows and watercourses clear and brilliant.   People coming home from market, birds singing, buds bursting, and the spring air full of beauty, life and hope.'

From D.H.Lawrence February 24th 1916 in Cornwall

'Just at present it is very cold.   It has been blowing here also, and a bit of snow.  Till now the weather has been so mild.  Primroses and violets are out, and the gorse is lovely.  At Zennor one infinite Atlantic, all peacock-mingled colours, and the gorse is sunshine itself, already.  But this cold wind is deadly.'

                                                                                   *

The Stranger

 

 

Who are you, stranger,

alone in the hospital bed,

lips blue and pinched,

hands wrinkled and red?

 

You are dying, I know,

although nothing was said.

 

Who were you, stranger,

alone in the hospital bed,

hair now sparse and silver,

but then - was it black, or chestnut, or red,

did it grow in abundance to halo your head?

 

You are dying, I know,

although nothing was said.

 

Who loved you, stranger,

alone in the hospital bed,

now fighting for breath - but then

did children embrace you

whom once you had fed?

Did you have husbands, or daughters, or sons,

or did you have lovers instead?

 

You are dying, I know,

although nothing was said.

 

I love you, stranger,

alone in the hospital bed,

I’m here watching you dying,

and holding your hand,

I see angels flying, coming for you,

my stranger, no longer alone

in the hospital bed.

 

                                                                              *

 

With very best wishes, Patricia

 

 

 

Navalny

 

Dear Reader,

                                                    A mid week offering

Navalny

 

You preached freedom

spoke of unity

told the people

of a better future

 

You loved your country

despised the rulers

their cruelty and lies

imagined peace

 

worked hard to

change the order

but it was not to be

they finished you

 

murdered you Navalny

tortured you

poisoned you

and with you went

 

hope and freedom

                                                                  *

 

With best wishes, Patricia

Of Different Stuff

 Dear reader,

Prunus cerasifera is a species of plum known by the common names cherry plum and myrobalan plum.  It is native to Southeast Europe and Western Asia, and is naturalized in the British Isles and scattered locations in North America.

The cherry plum is a popular ornamental tree for gardens and landscaping use, grown for its very early flowering. Cultivated cherry plums can have fruits, foliage, and flowers in any of several colours.  Some varieties have sweet fruits that can be eaten fresh, while others are sour and better for making jam.  It is a popular tree in Romania where its fruits are used for souring soups when immature, for eating raw when ripened and for making moonshine when over ripe because of their high sugar content.

There is one I can see from my sitting room window in someone else's garden and lovely it is too. I really feel that spring is unfolding, with daffodils and snowdrops in the flower beds.  And crocuses on the lawn.

                                                                            

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From Dorothy Wordsworth   February 14th 1798 in Somerset

Gathered sticks with William in the wood, he being unwell and not able to go further.  The young birch trees of a bright red, through which gleams a shade of purple.  Sat down in a thick part of the wood.  The near trees still, ever to their topmost boughs, but a perpetual motion in those that skirt the wood.  The breeze rose gently; its path distinctly marked, till it came to the very spot where we were. 

From Gilbert White  February 18th 1786 in Hampshire

Pleasant season: paths dry.  Men plough and sow.   Large titmouse sings his three notes.

 

From James Woodforde    February 18th 1795 in Norfolk

Very hard frost with strong easterly winds, a black frost.....Had a fire again in my bedchamber to-night.

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Of Different Stuff

 

 The ATS, the WAAFS, the WRENS,

rode in battleships,

flew spitfires and mosquitoes,

decoded enemy messages

nursed the wounded.

 

They tilled the land

drove tractors, fed the pigs,

birthed the lambs,

rose with the dawn,

went to bed late

exhausted and often hungry.

 

They walked alone in London

late at night

in the dark and dangerous streets,

they slept in freezing dormitories

shared a lavatory and basin

with twenty others.

 

These women were made

of different stuff.

They were fearless,

 they were brave.

 

                                          *

 

I am ashamed at my fearfulness

in the peace they fought for us,

gave us.

I am made, sadly, of different stuff.

 

                                                                                               ^*

^{With very best wishes, Patricia}

 

Revelation

 Dear Reader,

You are old, Father William,' the young man said
'And your hair has become very white;
and yet you incessantly stand on your head -
Do you think, at your age, it is right?'

Lewis Carroll 1832 - 1898

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson was better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll.  He was an English author, poet, mathematician and photographer. His most notable works are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and its sequel, Through the Looking Glass. He was noted for his facility with word play, logic and fantasy.  His poems Jabberwoky, and Hunting the Snark are classified in the genre of literary nonsense.

As a very young child he suffered a fever that left him deaf in one ear.  At the age of 17 he suffered a severe attack of whooping cough which was probably responsible for his chronically weak chest in later life.  In early childhood he acquired a stammer which he referred to as his "hesitation", it remained throughout his life.

Dodgson died of pneumonia following influenza on 14th January 1898.  He is commemorated at All Saints Church, Daresbury, in its stained glass windows depicting characters from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland erected in 1935.

 

                                                                        *

From D.H. Lawrence    February 9th  1919 in Derbyshire

'It is marvelous weather - brilliant sunshine on the snow, clear as a summer, slightly golden sun, distnace it up.  But it is immensely cold - everything frozen solid - milk, mustard, everything.  Yesterday I went out for a real walk- the bare top of the hills.  Wonderful it is to see the foot marks on the snow - beautiful ropes of rabbit prints, trailing away over the brows; heavy hare marks; a fox so sharp and dainty, going over the wall: birds with two feet that hop; very splendid straight advance of a pheasant; wood pigeons that are clumsy and move in flocks; splendid little leaping marks of weasels coming along like a necklace chain of berries; odd little filigree of the the field-mice; the trail of a mole - it is astonishing what a world of wild creatures one feels about one, on the hills in snow.' 

                                                                          *

Revelation

Why didn't they tell us
that
it was going to be like this

this difficult

that old age
lurks

thinking up something
to upset us

something to pain us
reduce us to tears

it comes in the night
creeps up on us
unawares

we didn't know that this was
our fate
until its arrival

                 much     too late

                                                                         *

With very best wishes, Patricia

                                                                                 *

Betrayal

Dear reader,

                                                                          The western Isles

I visited Dove cottage in the Lake District several years ago and found it most interesting being the home to William Wordsworth, the poet, for eight years and where he wrote some of his most famous works.

Dove Cottage was originally purpose-built as a public house where it acquired the name "Dove and Olive".   Trading ceased in 1793 and in l799 William and his sister, Dorothy, moved in.  Like many buildings in the Lake district Dove Cottage is made from local stone with white lime washed walls to keep out the damp.  The roof has slate tiles and chimneys have arrangements of slates on them to help prevent smoke blowing back down.  There are four rooms downstairs and another four upstairs.   The ground floor rooms retain the oak panels and slate floors often found in well built Lakeland houses of the period and appropriate to their original function as drinking rooms in a public house.

The kitchen was very primitive with just a tap over a stone basin.  No wonder they didn't do much cooking and most of their meals were made up with oats for porridge.  I bet the house was very cold when they lived there, I didn't see any radiators.  I often wonder how people managed in those days with the cold damp houses they lived in.  I wouldn't have survived a month of winter then.

                                                                                      *

From Dorothy Wordsworth   February 3rd 1798   in Somerset

Gathered sticks in the wood; a perfect stillness.  the red-breasts sang upon the leafless boughs,  Of a great number of sheep in the field, only one standing.  Returned to dinner at five o'clock.  The moonlight still and warm as a summer's night at nine o'clock.

 

From Francis Kilvert  February 6th  1874 in Wiltshire

Another fairy frost.  The rime froze on the trees during the night and this morning every bough was bearded with the delicate frost work.

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Betrayal

 

You were always there

for me, as I for you.

You read to me

you laughed with me

you told me stories

of magic and imagination.

 

We travelled north and south

to Scotland and the Western Isles

enjoyed Dorset, Devon, Cornwall.

Went to see the Lakes

peeped into Beatrix Potter’s house

felt cold in Dove Cottage where

you put my hand in your pocket.

 

We were one heart beat.

 

But you have gone.

Now I have to try to live

another life

with you not there,

with someone else perhaps,

someone to fill the empty gap

you left me with.

 

 Please forgive me darling

 

                                                                                      *

 

With very best wishes, Patricia