Monday Poetry , Canal Life, By : Ian McMillan
Ian McMillan
Canal Life
The canal tells you stories
The canal sings you songs
They hang in that space
Between memory and water
Once saw a narrowboat raised up,
Like it was cutting through the air,
Between two grass walls and the road below
Like it was sliding through history,
And a tiny vole swam across the water
So a tiny vole swam through history.
The canal tells you stories
The canal sings you songs
Once saw a man floating belly up in a canal
Like he was in the bath. He shouted
‘This is the life’ as I passed by on a narrowboat;
The sky was reflected in the surface
And we tied up in the places the map never showed us,
The man floating by, making ripples on the surface.
They hang in that space
Between memory and water
Once got waved at by a jogger as I stood gongoozling
On the towpath; her running gave rhythm
To the early afternoon, dog-strollers and kids
Who’d rather be here than sitting in school.
To gongoozle is to stand and watch narrowboats pass
And a canal is a lesson, a water-based school.
The canal tells you stories
The canal sings you songs
Once these canals were information highways
If coal and iron can be information,
And I think they can be. And there are bridges,
Pub gardens, the laughter of children
As they walk by the water; and the canals
Turn us all into curious children.
They hang in that space
Between memory and water
Once is never enough for a canal, I reckon;
You need to go back and see it again,
And sail it again, and smell it again, and
Touch it again; canals run through our veins
Like they stroll through this country
Like blood through our veins.
The canal tells you stories
The canal sings you songs
They hang in that space
Between memory and water
It’s the weekend so why not take a long walk ……
Black water river at Youghal, county cork.
Landscape photography : Nigel Borrington
It’s the weekend so why not get outside into the landscape and take a long walk, stay for a while until your completely relax ………
Have a great weekend everyone 🙂
Irish nature photography :Predatory Sawfly
Predatory Sawfly
Nature Photography : Nigel Borrington
At this time of year our local woodlands are full of wildlife with the insects at the height of their activities.
I was lucky enough to capture this Predatory Sawfly, yesterday evening, just while there was enough sun-light left to help get a bright image 🙂
Sawfly is the common name for insects belonging to suborder Symphyta of the order Hymenoptera. Sawflies are distinguishable from most other hymenopterans by the broad connection between the abdomen and the thorax, and by their caterpillar-like larvae. The common name comes from the saw-like appearance of the ovipositor, which the females use to cut into the plants where they lay their eggs. Large populations of certain sawfly species can cause substantial economic damage to forests and cultivated plants.
Swiss Cottage, Cahir, Co. Tipperary – A sense of place.
The Swiss cottage in country Tipperary is one of Ireland’s unsung treasures, it was built around 1810 and is a fine example of cottage orné, or ornamental cottage. It was originally part of the estate of Richard Butler, 10th Baron Cahir who married Emily Jefferys of Blarney , and the cottage was primarily used for entertaining day guests of the couple.
The cottage was designed by the architect John Nash, famous for designing many Regency buildings.
The cottage has been restored by the local group and the OPW and must be one of their most loved properties as the condition is just amazing.
If you are visiting county Tipperary this is a must see location !
Wiki link for John Nash
Swiss Cottage, Cahir, Co. Tipperary – A sense of place Gallery
“The unquiet spirit of a dandelion plume”, Ellen Mackay Hutchinson Cortissoz
Dandelion
Nature Photography : Nigel Borrington
Dandelion
By : Ellen Mackay Hutchinson Cortissoz
In the meadow-grass
The innocent white daisies blow,
The dandelion plume doth pass
Vaguely to and fro, –
The unquiet spirit of a flower
That hath too brief an hour.
A study of rain drops , macro image gallery
Study of Rain drops
Nature Photography : Nigel Borrington
We have just had a long weekend here in Ireland , with a bank holiday and as expected 🙂 it rained yesterday (Monday) . I had intended to do lots of walking but it was just to windy and wet. So I decided after looking out of the windows for a while to do a photo study of the rain.
These images are just a small selection and include some from lunchtime today as we still have some showers, I used a macro lens for these shots and the above image has also captured the amazing structure of the grass that the rain drops rested themselves on.
River Bend , A poem by: Rania Moallem
Rivers bend
River Suir, Co Tipperary
Nigel Borrington
River Bend
A poem by: Rania Moallem
I believe I’ve waited too much that
patience poured wild enough to
drown me at the verge of that river
bend, where I pointlessly dwell,
where you never pass by.
And the confusion I lastly saw in your eyes
perhaps was dusk and ashes of burnt
thoughts you’ve had about me, or was it
plain puzzlement…
I wonder.
For I had you hunting me at night again
waking up breathless to find you clinging to
the last gasp of air I relief with despair,
right before I fight to sleep again.
It might be the right time to move on.
Past this rivers bend …….
Ruin a Poem By S. A. J. Bradley
Irish Landscape Photography : Nigel Borrington
Ruin
Wondrous the stone of these ancient walls, shattered by fate.
The districts of the city have crumbled.
The work of giants of old lies decayed.
Roofs are long tumbled down,
The lofty towers are in ruins.
Frost covers the mortar,
Tiles weathered and fallen, undermined by age.
The original builders are long in the earth’s cruel grip,
generations since have passed.
These broad walls, now reddened and lichen-aged, brown and gray:
once they withstood invading kingdoms.
Now, beneath countless seasons, they have fallen.
The rampart assembled by many, crumbles still,
Though hewn together with skill of sharpening and joining,
Strengthened ingeniously with chain and cabled rib-walls.
In the town, urbane buildings, bathhouses, lofty rooftops,
a multitude gathered.
Many a hall filled with humans
until Fate inexorably changed everything.
All the inhabitants succumbed to pestilence.
Swept away are the great warriors.
Their towers and walls are deserted,
the desolate place crumbles away.
Who could repair any of it,
for they are long dead.
So the courtyards and gates have collapsed,
and the pavilion roofs of vaulted beams crumbled.
Here where once men in resplendent clothes, proud, gazed upon their gold and silver treasure,
their gems and precious stones,
upon their wealth, and property:
the bright city of a broad kingdom.
Stone courtyards ran streams of ample water, heating the great bathes,
conveniently flowing into the great stone vats …
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. A poem by: Samuel Taylor Coleridge
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Image : Nigel Borrington
From “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
The “Rime“ is one of the greatest pieces of Romantic literature. And the section of this epic poem in which the dead sailors get up and start sailing the boat again without seeing anything is as terrifying as anything in the horror genre.
The thick black cloud was cleft, and still
The Moon was at its side:
Like waters shot from some high crag,
The lightning fell with never a jag,
A river steep and wide.
The loud wind never reached the ship,
Yet now the ship moved on!
Beneath the lightning and the Moon
The dead men gave a groan.
They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose,
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes;
It had been strange, even in a dream,
To have seen those dead men rise.
The helmsman steered, the ship moved on;
Yet never a breeze up-blew;
The mariners all ‘gan work the ropes,
Where they were wont to do;
They raised their limbs like lifeless tools—
We were a ghastly crew.
The body of my brother’s son
Stood by me, knee to knee:
The body and I pulled at one rope,
But he said nought to me.
‘I fear thee, ancient Mariner!’
Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest!
‘Twas not those souls that fled in pain,
Which to their corses came again,
But a troop of spirits blest:
For when it dawned—they dropped their arms,
And clustered round the mast;
Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths,
And from their bodies passed.
Around, around, flew each sweet sound,
Then darted to the Sun;
Slowly the sounds came back again,
Now mixed, now one by one.
Sometimes a-dropping from the sky
I heard the sky-lark sing;
Sometimes all little birds that are,
How they seemed to fill the sea and air
With their sweet jargoning!
And now ’twas like all instruments,
Now like a lonely flute;
And now it is an angel’s song,
That makes the heavens be mute.
It ceased; yet still the sails made on
A pleasant noise till noon,
A noise like of a hidden brook
In the leafy month of June,
That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.
Till noon we quietly sailed on,
Yet never a breeze did breathe:
Slowly and smoothly went the ship,
Moved onward from beneath.
Under the keel nine fathom deep,
From the land of mist and snow,
The spirit slid: and it was he
That made the ship to go.
The sails at noon left off their tune,
And the ship stood still also.
The Sun, right up above the mast,
Had fixed her to the ocean:
But in a minute she ‘gan stir,
With a short uneasy motion—
Backwards and forwards half her length
With a short uneasy motion.
Then like a pawing horse let go,
She made a sudden bound:
It flung the blood into my head,
And I fell down in a swound.
The Triple deity and the number three in Pagan Mythology , the Corleck Hill stone head
Corleck Hill stone head
The Triple deity
Photo : Nigel Borrington
Last weekend I visited the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin, to take a good look at some of the pagan/ per-christian objects that they have on permanent display.
One of the items that really captured my attention was the Corleck Hill – Carved stone head, a sculpture in the form of a triple deity. I think this stone is fascinating and provides a mythological link between per-christian Ireland and the wider world, well before the 1st century AD.
I have spent sometime this week doing a little study on the stone head and reading as much as I can find about its form, so I just wanted to share some on the images I took from the visit and some of the details I have found so far.
The Corleck Hill stone head
Stone Head
Object Number: IA:1998.72
Stone HeadCarved stone head. Early Iron Age, 1st – 2nd century AD. Known since it came to scientific attention in 1937 as the Corleck head, this three-faced stone idol was found in the townland of Drumeague, Co. Cavan around the year 1855. It appears that it was one of a number of carvings found, including a bearded bust now known as the Corraghy head that was later built into a barn in the nearby townland of that name. Thomas Barron, the local historian who brought the three-faced head to the attention of the National Museum spent a lifetime researching the local traditions concerning the find and he concluded that the figures were associated with a shrine located at Drumeague Hill. Nearby is Corleck Hill where it appears that between 1832 and 1900 a Passage Tomb surrounded by a stone circle and a circular embankment 70 yards in diameter were dismantled. The site of these monuments was the center of an important Lughnasa festival that celebrated the harvest, an ancient Celtic tradition that survives into modern times. Other Celtic stone heads have been found in the vicinity such as those from Corravilla and Cavan Town and the find place of the three-faced idol is but twelve miles distant from Loughcrew, Co. Meath. A little further north there is another group of Iron Age stone carvings that appear to be centred on the vicinity of Emhain Macha, the main political and ritual site of ancient Ulster. The likelihood is that the Corleck Head was associated with a shrine reflecting Romano-British traditions located close to where the carving was discovered. The three-faced carving is the finest of its type and there is a small hole in the base to assist its being stood securely, perhaps on a pedestal. One of the faces is heavy browed and all of them have bossed eyes, a broad nose and slit mouth. One of the mouths has a small circular hole at the centre and this feature is also found on two of the Co. Armagh carvings and on another from Woodlands, Co. Donegal. There are several examples of this feature from Yorkshire the best known occurring on two three-faced idols from Greetland, near Halifax. The feature also occurs on a stone head from Anglesey, Wales. H. 33cm; Max. W. 22.5cm.
What is the triple deity
A triple deity (sometimes referred to as threefold, tripled, triplicate, tripartite, triune or triadic, or as a trinity) is a deity associated with the number three. Such deities are common throughout world mythology; the number three has a long history of mythical associations. Carl Jung considered the arrangement of deities into triplets an archetype in the history of religion.
In mythological and its art,three separate beings may represent either a triad who always appear as a group (Greek Moirai, Charites, Erinnyes; Norse Norns; or the Irish Morrígna) or a single deity known from literary sources as having three aspects (Greek Hecate, Diana Nemorensis). In the case of the Irish Brigid it can be ambiguous whether she is a single goddess or three sisters, all named Brigid. The Morrígan also appears sometimes as one being, and at other times as three sisters, as do the three Irish goddesses of sovereignty, Ériu, Fódla and Banba.
The Matres or Matronae are usually represented as a group of three but sometimes with as many as 27 (3 × 3 × 3) inscriptions. They were associated with motherhood and fertility. Inscriptions to these deities have been found in Gaul, Spain, Italy, the Rhineland and Britain, as their worship was carried by Roman soldiery dating from the mid 1st century to the 3rd century AD. Miranda Green observes that “triplism” reflects a way of “expressing the divine rather than presentation of specific god-types. Triads or triple beings are ubiquitous in the Welsh and Irish mythic imagery” (she gives examples including the Irish battle-furies, Macha, and Brigit). “The religious iconographic repertoire of Gaul and Britain during the Roman period includes a wide range of triple forms: the most common triadic depiction is that of the triple mother goddess” (she lists numerous examples).
More ( A fascinating read !!!)
Flora & Fauna , A Poem by crowbarius – Hello Poetry
Flora & Fauna
Irish Nature Photography : Nigel Borrington
Flora & Fauna
Flora and Fauna, the sisters of Season
Of Spring and of Summer
Allow now our drummer
To drum out the beat
For the feet of the sisters
To glide and to creep
Like the encroaching sleep
Which may perch on your shoulder if we cannot keep you awake
And on the edge of your seat, sir.
Now the former, sweet Flora, will finger the flute
While the other continues to glide and to slide
Like a sequined Venetian harlequin bride;
And now Fauna will mimic the movements of bird and of beast
As she graces the work of our landscape artiste
And all is completely unfeasible
Completely lacks reason
We guarantee.
Presently
In the eye of the beholder
Sweet Flora seemingly draws from the aether a lyre
And with flourishing fingers she plucks from the heavens
A song of the seasons, a pagan ode to Pan!
Behold! No aid of hoops, no strings
The vestal-virgin-harlot sisters sing
Of beautiful Persephone
And with unseen damselfly wings
Ascend from mediocrity
All melody forgotten
All the drums create cacophony
And you will find serenity in chaotic monotony
Now let this climaxing crescendo banish all your sorrowing!
No more that light; no more that sacred realm
Life’s door was dappled gloam; now all is black.
A man of wax with saintly, hollow eyes
Devoid of sin, devoid of love and light
That golden room is lost – you can’t turn back.
Now love has lost its lustre – lust lost joy
And coy eyes turn to watch the empty man
Struck by eternal beauty, and condemned
To haunt the broken world of mortal men;
And shrilling wind caresses empty hand.
Irish Woodland flowers : Greater Stitchwort (Stellaria holostea)
Greater Stitchwort
Stellaria holostea
Nigel Borrington
Each day this month as I go for a walk with our dog Molly, into some of our local woodland I have noticed all the wildflowers of May time and they have been a wonderful sight .
Greater Stichwort with its pure white flower heads and tall stems are just some of these.
About
Greater Stitchwort grows in woods, roadside verges, hedgerows and grassy banks. It has many other common names including ‘Wedding Cakes’, ‘Star-of-Bethlehem’, ‘Daddy’s-shirt-buttons’ and ‘Snapdragon’ – the latter because its stems are brittle and easily break. It’s pretty star-shaped, white flowers bloom from April to June; as the seed capsules ripen, they can be heard ‘popping’ in late spring.
How to identify
Greater Stitchwort has five white petals, each deeply notched and almost divided into two. Its green leaves are grass-like in appearance and its brittle stems are square. Greater Stitchwort has larger flowers (2-3cm across) than its relative, Lesser Stitchwort (0.5-1cm across).
http://www.wildlifetrusts.org/species/greater-stitchwort
County Kilkenny Landscape images, south east Ireland through a lens
Kilkenny Landscape Images
Nigel Borrington
Summertime in County Kilkenny can bring some wonderful changes to the surrounding landscape and today I just want to share a gallery of images taken during the following months.
It a great time of year with so much to look forward to ……
County Kilkenny Landscape Gallery
Derrynaflan Hoard, National Museum of Ireland
Derrynaflan Chalice
Photo : Nigel Borrington
On Saturday I spent the day in Dublin , shopping and visiting different Museums , including the National Museum of Ireland .
One of my main interests in doing so was to take a fresh look and the Derrynaflan Hoard, I posted on the items in this collection and about the Island of Derrynaflan , county Tipperary – last October.
The Derrynaflan chalice is one of the most amazing historic items to view and the story (Below) of how it was discovered just as fascinating. Seeing this hoard just make you wonder how many more items like it have yet to be found or sadly never will be.
The following two images are from Saturdays vistit :
Island of Derrynaflan
The Island of Derrynaflan is located in County Tipperary and these days it is surrounded by recovered drained land that is harvested for it’s peat, this peat being turned into fuel.
The images below and the text are from my post last year :
Discovering the Hoard
Derrynaflan Island, County Tipperary
Irish Landscape Photography : Nigel Borrington
The Derrynaflan hoard is one of the most spectacular hoard discoveries in Ireland, which led first to an increase in enthusiasm for metal detecting as a hobby, but ultimately contributed to the prohibition of unlicensed searching for archaeological material.
On 17 February 1980, Michael Webb and his son, also called Michael, discovered a significant hoard of early church treasure in Derrynaflan, in the townland of Lurgoe, County Tipperary, using metal detectors (Kelly 1994: 213; O’Riordain 1983: 1). The hoard included a chalice, a bronze strainer ladle and a paten (a kind of small plate) (and see Ryan 1983 for a detailed description), and the discovery was described as ‘one of the most exciting events in the history of Irish art’ (Stalley 1990: 186). The large monastic enclosure in which the hoard was found was partially protected as a National Monument (Kelly 1993: 378). The finders reported their discovery to an archaeologist from University College Cork, Dr. Elizabeth Shee Twohig (Kelly, pers. comm., 2012), who advised them that they must take the finds to the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin (Houses of the Oireachtas 1986; O’Riordain 1983: 1). Under Irish law at that time, the finders were entitled to a reward for making the discovery, in this case decided at IR£10,000 (Houses of the Oireachtas 1986), although this was initially rejected by the finders as insufficient compared to the value of the find (Kelly 1994: 213).
Six years later, the High Court made a ruling that the find or its value (estimated at IR£5.5 million) should be returned to the finders (Kelly 1994: 113). The public mood turned against the Webbs, who were shown on the main evening television news drinking champagne to celebrate the ruling. Ireland was then in deep recession with massive public service cuts which led to resentment that the Webbs might benefit to the tune of IR£5.5 million from the public purse (Kelly, pers comm., 2012). A year later, in 1987, a further final judgement was delivered by the Supreme Court that the Derrynaflan Hoard in fact belonged to the state and not to the finders (Kelly 1995a). The finders finally received a reward of IR£50,000 (Kelly 1994: 214).
The impact of the case on Irish law concerning the protection of heritage was significant. Debates in the Seánad Éireann (upper house of the Irish Parliament) in 1986 indicate the split in opinions regarding the validity of the claim of the finders to the hoard (as had been decided in court the previous year), with one Senator suggesting that the state should have been trying to prove that the Webbs had no legal claim to the hoard, one Senator regarding such discoveries as no more than looting, and another claiming that the finders should instead be praised for the care with which they removed the hoard from the ground and for going to the National Museum to report the discovery (Houses of the Oireachtas 1986). In 1987 the National Monuments (Amendment) Bill, which included clauses on metal detecting and ancient shipwrecks (another area becoming vulnerable to looting), passed through its final stages in the Dáil Éireann (lower house of the Irish Parliament) (Gosling 1987: 23).
Ireland’s National Monuments Act 1930 had prohibited the excavation of archaeological objects other than under license (Kelly 1995a). However, the maximum fine for a successful prosecution at that time, at IR£10[1], proved not to be a strong deterrent (Kelly 1995b: 235). The discovery of the Derrynaflan Hoard had reputedly contributed to the growth of the metal detecting hobby in Ireland, which by the time of the discovery saw hobbyists searching not only ploughed land and other locations away from archaeological sites, but also on known archaeological sites (Kelly 1993: 378). A 2012 Irish news item, which described an athlete as having ‘more gold than they found in Derrynaflan’ (Keane 2012) indicates that the finding of the hoard is still recalled in Irish popular memory. However, with the National Monuments (Amendment) Act 1987, ‘it became illegal to search for archaeological objects with metal detectors or other electronic detecting devices without license’. A further National Monuments (Amendment) Act 1994 specified the state ownership of archaeological objects, and made it ‘an offence to trade in unreported antiquities, or withhold information about archaeological discoveries’ (Kelly 1995a). Under the 1994 legislation, the maximum penalty was also increased to a fine of IR£50,000 and five years imprisonment (National Monuments (Amendment) Act 1994, Section 13). The National Monuments (Amendment) Act 1987 had been in preparation for many years and so was not a direct reaction solely to the controversy surrounding the hoard (Kelly, pers. comm., 2012), although there were observations made that the upsurge in metal detecting as a result of the discovery led to changes in the law (Kelly 1994: 214).
Ref : http://traffickingculture.org/encyclopedia/case-studies/derrynaflan-hoard/
A visit two Derrynaflan island Gallery
The Old Lane Through The Woods – Poem by jim hogg , Kilkenny Landscape photography
The Old Lane Through The Woods
Black and white landscapes
Nigel Borrington
The Old Lane Through The Woods –
Poem by jim hogg
There’s a track through the trees from the White to the Black
that I walked as a kid and I often went back.
Now the years slip away and the distances grow,
but if time gives us time and we get to change tack
if the notion should take you then I’d gladly go:
in wildest November before winter’s trance,
at the height of the spring when the daffodils dance.
We could stand on the bank where the Rhodies convene,
like the first of our kind who looked down on that scene,
on a loch with no name, with no castles around,
or old burial ground of the meek and the mean;
though the rich bled the poor, by the sod they’re all bound.
Or we’ll maybe just stay on the old woodland road
and head north to the Black with the odd jumping toad.
There’s a whole constellation of things we can view.
In the summer there’s herons and sometimes deer too,
and there’s dodging and weaving through armies of leaves.
Though the foxgloves are rare I’ll find one just for you,
and then swing on the Ivy through Sycamore trees.
If you ever have time we could wander off down
that old lane through the woods whether wintry or lown.
But I know all too well that this life is a crush.
There’d be too much to do if we didn’t all rush.
And I wonder sometimes how it all went so wrong;
but they’re calling it progress with hardly a blush –
in a world where rich hippies can still sing along.
There’s a place where that craziness doesn’t hold sway;
if you’re ever back home we could go there some day
Cuckoo-flower / Lady’s Smock , Irish Nature Photography
Cuckoo-flower / Lady’s Smock
Nigel Borrington
In late springtime here in county Kilkenny – Ireland, I always notice when the wild flower come out.
Some of the most noticeable are the Cuckoo flowers, they grow at the side of rivers and along damp woodland paths.
I always feel like summer has started in full when I first see them …..
Cuckoo-flower / Lady’s Smock
Cardamine pratensis
Biolar gréagáin
Family: Brassicaceae
Flowering time: March-June. Perennial. Native.
Large white to pinkish-mauve flowers. Yellow anthers. Colour depends
on habitat, pink-mauve on dryer ground. Fruit with long or short style.
Basal leaves round / oval, in rosette. Stem leaves narrow-lanceolate.
Variable plant, sometimes with runners. Height: To 60 cm
Very frequent. Damp meadows and lawns, stream sides, open moist woodland.
A vote for All the colors of the Rainbow, Ireland’s same-sex marriage referendum. May 22nd 2015
All the colours of the Rainbow
Nigel Borrington
This Friday (May 22nd) Ireland votes in a referendum for same-sex marriage and its a big moment for this country !!!
I don’t usually comment here , if at all about social of political issues , this is my area of personal escape in many ways from these areas !!!
However by posting one of my rainbow images here , I hope I make it very clear what I am thinking !!!
We as a race (HUMAN RACE!!!) need everyone – all ( colors, shapes and sizes ) and this involves everyone being equal and thus having the same rights in all areas of life !!!
SO Clearly I will be Voting YES!!!! 🙂 🙂
Rainbow Colors
by Sharon MacDonald
A rainbow of colors,
In the light, after rain.
There are seven of them,
And, each one has a name.
Red is the first
Rainbow color in the sky.
Orange is next
Like jack-o-lantern pie.
Yellow is the third,
Lemons come to mind.
Color four is green,
Think of grassy hills to climb
Blue is color five,
Like the water in a lake
The sixth is indigo
Blue-gray blends that you can make.
Violet is the color
Of the last rainbow band.
Violet is flowery;
Like the pedals in your hand.
So, wave your arms above you
Cast your colors high
And, try to make a rainbow
Across a cloudy sky
Free the alternatives of life !!!!!
God, ” A nasty surprise in a sandwich ” – Poem by James Fenton
God, A Poem –
Poem by James Fenton
A nasty surprise in a sandwich,
A drawing-pin caught in your sock,
The limpest of shakes from a hand which
You’d thought would be firm as a rock,
A serious mistake in a nightie,
A grave disappointment all round
Is all that you’ll get from th’Almighty,
Is all that you’ll get underground.
Oh he said: ‘If you lay off the crumpet
I’ll see you alright in the end.
Just hang on until the last trumpet.
Have faith in me, chum-I’m your friend.’
But if you remind him, he’ll tell you:
‘I’m sorry, I must have been pissed-
Though your name rings a sort of a bell. You
Should have guessed that I do not exist.
‘I didn’t exist at Creation,
I didn’t exist at the Flood,
And I won’t be around for Salvation
To sort out the sheep from the cud-
‘Or whatever the phrase is. The fact is
In soteriological terms
I’m a crude existential malpractice
And you are a diet of worms.
‘You’re a nasty surprise in a sandwich.
You’re a drawing-pin caught in my sock.
You’re the limpest of shakes from a hand which
I’d have thought would be firm as a rock,
‘You’re a serious mistake in a nightie,
You’re a grave disappointment all round-
That’s all you are, ‘ says th’Almighty,
‘And that’s all that you’ll be underground.’
1983
The River Of Life, A poem By Thomas Campbell
River of life, River Suir
Clonmel , Ireland
Landscape Photography : Nigel Borrington
The River Of Life
Poem by Thomas Campbell
The more we live, more brief appear
Our life’s succeeding stages;
A day to childhood seems a year,
And years like passing ages.
The gladsome current of our youth,
Ere passion yet disorders,
Steals lingering like a river smooth
Along its grassy borders.
But as the careworn cheek grows wan,
And sorrow’s shafts fly thicker,
Ye stars, that measure life to man,
Why seem your courses quicker?
When joys have lost their bloom and breath,
And life itself is vapid,
Why, as we reach the Falls of Death
Feel we its tide more rapid?
It may be strange—yet who would change
Time’s course to slower speeding,
When one by one our friends have gone,
And left our bosoms bleeding?
Heaven gives our years of fading strength
Indemnifying fleetness;
And those of youth, a seeming length,
Proportioned to their sweetness.
The River Of Life
Thomas Campbell
The Growth of a Seed – By Dan Farella
The Growth of a seed
Nature Photography : Nigel Borrington
The Growth of a Seed
– By Dan Farella
The growth of a seed
Starts with a need
A feeling inside her
Like a burning fire
Glowing to inspire
And the growth transpires
Inside her that fire
Burning brighter and brighter
Ignites her into a frenzy of burning desire
To lift herself higher, and higher, and higher…
A desire to surrender to the growth that transpires
And she never grows tired, growing, and growing
And a sprout grows out from beyond the doubt
The shadows get exposed to the light of insight
As the stem grows longer getting stronger and stronger
The days get brighter and her spirit feels lighter
The pulsing emanates from a sacred place…
Babump…. babump… babump….
Reaching for the light radiating inner sight
[And an animal comes to take a little bite]
And the nutrients they grow as the energy it flows
And the time has come for her soul to become one
So she sends out her leaves allows herself to be alive
No running no hiding and nowhere to go
So it waits and it grows and it sits and it flows
As the thoughts pass by and she holds her composure
Growing and growing flowing and flowing
Getting taller and stronger
Allowing herself to be seen
It goes on and on as she reaches her dawn
Only to know that its time for her to move on
And release her seeds to the wind, set sail
And she trusts they will grow through wind, rain, or hail
As she brings all the energy up into her crown
The wind begins to blow as she listens to the sound
And she knows its time to let her children take flight
Getting lost in the life, the love, and de-light
She completes her deed and she dies a slow death
But she knows she will go back into the goddess breath
Where she feeds the soil that will grow her kin
With the nutrients she once used to help her begin
And she feels a sense of right-ness and completeness inside
As she knows that she worked with Natures highest design
And she never grows tired, growing and growing
Reaping and sowing, reaping and sowing.
– By Dan Farella
Blue flowers , they stands for desire the infinite and unreachable
Blue flowers of , Common-Field-Speedwell
Nature Photography : Nigel Borrington
Blue flowers must be one of the hardest types of wild flowers to find, these Field-Speedwell’s are just some of a few we have in our local woodlands.
Blue in nature has been used as a powerful symbol, the following uses are just a few …..
Blue flowers
A blue flower is a central symbol of inspiration. It stands for desire, love, and the metaphysical striving for the infinite and unreachable. It symbolizes hope and the beauty of things.
Early use of the symbol of blue flowers
German author Novalis used the symbol in his unfinished Bildungsroman, entitled Heinrich von Ofterdingen. After contemplating a meeting with a stranger, the young Heinrich von Ofterdingen dreams about a blue flower which calls to him and absorbs his attention.
Explanation of the symbol of blue flowers
In the book Heinrich von Ofterdingen the blue flower symbolises the joining of human with nature and the spirit so the understanding of nature and coincident of the self is growing. In the Romantic the meaning of human was a continuation from Humanism and the Age of Enlightenment, but the focus was on the own emotions not on abstract theory. Understanding and thinking rise in the comprehension of Romantic from own individual love. Feeling is based on the self, thinking is based on the self and the development of the self leads the individual person. Also very important is contemplation. About the feeling, the thinking and contemplation personal inward cognition is possible. The process of cognition merge again with own individual love. The self and the nature is in this theory always linked.
Use of the symbol
Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff wrote a poem called Die blaue Blume (The blue flower). Adelbert von Chamisso saw the core of Romanticism in the motif, and Goethe searched for the “Urpflanze” or “original plant” in Italy, which in some interpretations could refer to the blue flower. E. T. A. Hoffmann used the Blue Flower as a symbol for the poetry of Novalis and the “holy miracle of nature” in his short tale “Nachricht von den neuesten Schicksalen des Hundes Berganza”.
In 1902, Charles Scribner’s Sons published “The Blue Flower”, a collection of short stories by Henry Van Dyke, the first two of which, “The Blue Flower” and “The Source” refer to the blue flower as a symbol of desire and hope, and the object of the narrator’s search. This volume also includes Van Dyke’s most famous story, “The Other Wise Man”.
Blue rose
Walter Benjamin used the image of the blue flower several times in his writing. For example the opening sentence of his essay Dream Kitsch: “No one really dreams any longer of the Blue Flower. Whoever awakes as Heinrich von Ofterdingen today must have overslept.” Also in his Work of Art essay: “The equipment-free aspect of reality has here become the height of artifice, and the vision of immediate reality the Blue Flower in the land of technology.”
C.S. Lewis, in his autobiographical book, Surprised By Joy, references the “Blue Flower” when speaking of the feelings of longing that beauty ellicited when he was a child of six. He associates it with the German word sehnsucht, and states that this intense longing for things transcendent made him “a votary of the Blue Flower.”
English writer Penelope Fitzgerald’s historical novel The Blue Flower is based on Novalis’s early life. In John le Carré’s 1968 novel A Small Town in Germany, the character Bradfield says, “I used to think I was a Romantic, always looking for the blue flower.” (Pan edition, p. 286 – chap. 17) Substance D, a fictitious drug in Philip K. Dick’s 1977 novel A Scanner Darkly, is derived from a plant with blue flower.
Tennessee Williams used images of blue roses in his play, The Glass Menagerie, to symbolize the frailty and uniqueness of Laura, a central character that reflects the life of Williams’ sister, who underwent a lobotomy. In the play, Laura is nicknamed “Blue Roses” after another character misheard her say “pleurosis”.
In his fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire, American author George R. R. Martin uses the blue flower as a reoccurring symbol to represent young women of the noble House Stark, often with hints to an illicit love affair. In one instance, Prince Rhaegar Targaryen uses blue winter roses to crown the Lady Lyanna Stark as the “Queen of Love and Beauty” at the Tournament of Harrenhal, passing over his own wife, Princess Elia of Dorne.
“Blue Flower” is the name of a song by the British avant-garde pop band of the early 1970s, Slapp Happy, later covered by the 1990s indy rock bands Pale Saints and Mazzy Star. “Blue Flowers” is a song by the alternative MC, Kool Keith (AKA Dr. Octagon), on his 1996 album, Dr. Octagonecologyst.
From Blossoms, Poem By : Li-Young Lee
From Blossoms
Nature Photography : Nigel Borrington
From Blossoms
By : Li-Young Lee
From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.
From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.
O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.
There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.
– Li-Young Lee
Lilleshall Abbey Shropshire, England
Lilleshall Abbey, Shropshire, England,
Landscape Photography : Nigel Borrington
Lilleshall Abbey Shropshire, England
On a very wet day back in April 2015, I visited Lilleshall Abbey Shropshire, while driving back from London to a friends home in North Wales. The Abbey is located just north of the M54 junction 5, near the village of Lilleshall.
To find the Abbey just follow the Brown tourist signs when you leave the motorway.
The weather was somehow fitting for making a visit here as it made it very clear just how life would have been for the 11th century monks who lived their lives here ( cold , wet and isolated ).
This text form wikipedia on the Abbey, describes very well the life of a monk and contains a great history of the Abbey …
Lilleshall Abbey Shropshire, England
The monastic life
The abbey’s community were Augustinian Canons Regular or conventual canons, not technically monks. Although the Arrouaisians were at first noted for their austerity of life, they were less enclosed than Benedictine or Cistercian monks. Arrouaisian houses were noted for the high quality of their liturgical observance. A prayer roll of about 1375 confirms that this was so at Lilleshall more than two centuries after the foundation.
There was a large number of benefactions from lay landowners and these often came with requests to be buried or prayed for at Lilleshall or for membership of the fraternity of the abbey. Late in the 12th century, for example, John Lestrange, a local baron with holdings further afield, got into a dispute with Ramsey Abbey over the church at Holme-next-the-Sea in Norfolk. In a settlement acceptable to all, he gave the church to Lilleshall Abbey, for the health of his own and his wife’s souls. Shortly afterwards he added the church at Shangton in Leicestershire, adding specifically “the body of his wife Amicia when she shall have gone the way of all flesh.” Similarly, Robert de Kayley gave the abbey two thirds of his land at Freasley, in Dordon, Warwickshire, on condition that it accept his body for burial.This suggests that its monastic life quickly built up a reputation for holiness that could be acquired by proximity, and one that clearly persisted into the later Middle Ages. John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, spent two days at the abbey, together with his wife Katherine Swynford and a large retinue. He had fallen ill after the 24th parliament of Richard II’s reign was held at Shrewsbury, dissolving on 31 January 1398. Gaunt himself, his wife, and his squire, William Chetwynd, were received into the fraternity, and Gaunt made a gift of twenty pounds of gold.
Although the fraternity was important in diffusing the influence of the abbey, there is no evidence of lay brothers and sisters being admitted to the abbey community itself. This is unexpected as the Abbey of Arrouaise had admitted lay members at least since the time of Abbot Gervais. There were many employees, however. In the mid-15th century, there were over twenty household servants, including two porters, a butler, a chamberlain, two cooks, a baker, a bell-ringer, a cobbler, and washerwoman, as well as a carpenter and a group of apprentices to carry out repairs. There was a tannery on the premises, as well as a brewery. Self-sufficiency was an important feature of Arrouaisian houses. Arrouaise itself had a similar but even larger and more differentiated lay labour force.
The canons were much employed in managing the abbey’s substantial estates, which seem to have been worked mainly by indentured servants and later by wage labour. A fairly high proportion of the abbey’s land was kept in demesne, cultivated from granges. The Lilleshall estate alone had four of these and there was a ring of further granges in Shropshire and Staffordshire, with two outlying at Blackfordby and Grindlow. The grange at Blackfordby seems to have absorbed a good deal of time and labour, with canons often staying there. There was even a chapel on site, with mass said three times a week. This was strictly irregular, as it was considered perilous to the soul for a canon to reside anywhere alone, and there were complaints about it from the Bishop of Lichfield. However, the nature of the abbey’s estates meant that canons would often require leave to travel. Both this and the increasingly unfavourable agrarian conditions and labour market of the 14th century meant that direct exploitation of demesnes was gradually reduced in favour of leasing out land.
The abbey was not noted for its intellectual life. However, there was some kind of library and a copy of a chronicle ascribed to Peter of Ickham has survived from it, with additions made locally. There is also evidence of a canon being licensed to study at university for 10 years from 1400.
John Mirk, a Lilleshall canon of the late 14th and early 15th centuries did make a literary mark. He wrote in the local West Midland dialect of Middle English and at least two of his works were widely copied and used. Festial is a collection of homilies for the festivals of the Liturgical year as it was celebrated in his time in Shropshire. Instructions for Parish Priests is in lively vernacular verse, using octosyllabic lines and rhyming couplets throughout. Mirk intended to ensure that priests had the resources to give good counsel to their flock. The existence of such works suggests that the canons were actively engaged with the liturgical and pastoral work of their region, if not at the highest scholarly level.
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I really enjoyed taking a pause in my long drive here, even in the heavy British rains and would recommend a visit if your ever passing by …..
Lilleshall Abbey a Gallery
Nigel Borrington 
Sunday Evening in the tree tops, county Cork , Ireland
Sunday Evening, Co.cork Ireland
Landscape Photography : Nigel Borrington
Sunday evenings are some of my favorite times of the week, the weekends light is fading fast and we have a new week ahead of us, and new chances to grow and reach our aims.
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June 7, 2015 | Categories: Comment, Images for the weekend, Landscape | Tags: Cork, Landscape Photography, New week, Sunday, sunday evenings | 2 Comments