finding equilibrium at Alban Elfed Recently, during a course I was part of, we wrote ‘life reviews’. There were lots of ways to approach the prompt — focussing on decades or smaller units of time, key people and relationships, taking a particular thread of development — emotional, sexual, intellectual, roles, career… I wrote my notes … Read more
wonderings on rain, relationships and connection This year began wet — drenching, howling wet. As though the world could not shed enough tears. How could any of us? The world grown strange and terrible, as the wise have been telling us it would for decades… and are still telling us: Nobody likes to be reminded … Read more
To turn towards devotion I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.I do know how to pay attention, how to fall downinto the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, writes Mary Oliver in the poem ‘The Summer Day’ On Wednesday we were in the path of a solar eclipse. The partial phase began … Read more
because life is irreducible Outside the window overlooking the orchard, the apple trees, impossibly green, foliage riotous, first fruit held high to ripen, a chorus of voices blackbirdwrengarden warblerchaffinchsparrowgoldfinchnuthatchrobinchiffchaff Sparrow and blackbird competing for the solo parts above another chorus line, human voices drifting from the tourist gite along the path into the forest, the … Read more
when urgency falls away We have reached the season of Lughnasadh, the first harvest, corn being cut. In the fields John Barleycorn, who laid with the Lady in the woods at Beltane, has aged, bearded and head bent. The Sun has transformed him, green to gold, and his time to leave this life of earth … Read more
A journey with yew, hawthorn and hazel I’ve been walking the maze in the garden here at Reagh with Adam. The maze is large and the deep hedges are of yew and hawthorn. At its centre a single hazel tree. Trees are sanctuaries … They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach … ancient … Read more
A celebration and an invitation I wake in a foreign country, in a scrap of forest in the middle of nowhere, beside a love I’ve known only a decade. How did I get here? Iona, June 1984. We have gathered for a week of retreat, to ponder our stories as women. We eat, cook, clean … Read more
in the season of Beltan What is your relationship with fire? It can be a tricky element. My relationship with it is ambivalent, at best. Yet fire has made us the species we are. There’s a theory that the discovery and subsequent ability to cook our food to extract more of its energy led to … Read more
the grace of making in dark time Hello friends, familiar and new, and welcome to a house in a hamlet in a forest in Finistère. I’m Jan and I hold spaces for those on journeys of transformation. I believe story is powerful and that the earth offers healing through our daily connection and herbal allies. … Read more
when times are dark Slow morning. We’ve sat on the bed overlooking the sea, cups of herbal tea, writing and reading… Eventually, a late breakfast. Porridge with oat milk, a twist of salt, hemp and pumpkin seeds, a scatter of walnuts, plump blueberries and raspberries, a curl of honey and dollop of Greek yoghurt… On … Read more