On a never-ending January day, the whole garden drips with silent grief. There are a few sparse, dried-up leaves clinging desperately to the willow, now pollarded and looking sorry for itself. No birds alight on its branches, not even the magpie, which has taken to haunting the silver birch right at the end near the […]
Category: Haibun
In the Cathedral
I am not a member of an organised religion but I believe I am a spiritual person. Although I don’t attend church, I like to visit them, whether they are small local churches or cathedrals. I love the quiet, the smell of burning candles and incense, and stained glass windows. Many large cathedrals have crypts, […]
Waiting
I am waiting for the rain to stop. When it does, I will pull on wellies, shrug on a well-worn waterproof jacket and wrap a woollen scarf around my neck, ready for a walk in the woods. Raindrops trickle down the window pane in a race against time. I am waiting for the rain to […]
Almost Home
Yesterday I returned from a visit to my daughter. We celebrated her birthday and I babysat my grandson when her husband took her out for a meal. It was only for a few days but, while the journey there went smoothly and took only a couple of hours, the return took much longer than expected. […]
Changes
I remember how hard it was when I discovered I was pregnant and experienced so many changes that I wasn’t expecting. When I gave birth, then took my baby home and had to look after her on my own for the first time; I was scared I’d get it wrong and terrified I we wouldn’t […]
Rustling Leaves
At this time of year leaves cover the garden, revealing more of the captivating and resilient birch trees with their slender twiggy branches. Even the beech has creamy-pink bark with copper- coloured stems, the remaining […]
October Apples
Some of the windfalls have been collected and piled on a plastic garden chair. There are no signs of wild-life bites or nibbles, and only one green apple among them. They blush with October colours and scent. Among them, one is more than half russet, almost bronze, a bruised rogue among the beauties. It must […]
Morning
Since I retired and as I get older, I find I need less sleep. I frequently wake around three, four or five o’clock, unable to return to the dark cocoon that enveloped me so cosily when I was younger. When the cats chirrup from the bedroom door, I no longer turn over and burrow back […]
No crickets here
I’ve always been attracted to the sound of crickets. As a child, I was enchanted by their presence in American films, when characters sat on the porch in the evening to a soundtrack of crickets chirping; and then, when I visited Italy several times during summer, I was amazed by the constant background noise, even […]
Hiroshima Spores
I wasn’t alive in August 1945 – I arrived eleven years and a day after Fat Man was dropped on Nagasaki. I knew nothing of the horrors of those atomic bombs until I saw ‘The Bomb’, Episode 24 of ’The World at War’, a documentary series I watched with my father and, more recently, with […]
writing in north norfolk 