Enchanted Places

Some places feel “enchanted”. The ancient Celts talked about “thin places” where they sensed something divine.

The Long Mynd in Shropshire is one such place for me. In the morning there is a special kind of silence there, broken only by the occasional chirping of birds, the bleating of sheep and the whinnying of wild ponies.

~

The earth is still enchanted

By these worlds we have not planted

~

Wild moor

And hill

~

The silence of these places

Has power to move me still.

~

Out of the Darkness

The Wrekin looms out of the darkness on a Shropshire morning in March 2021. I drive past this iconic hill Monday to Friday every week, and sometimes it just speaks of life, for good, to me, as it did on this day…

~

Out of the darkness

It looms

~

The curving back

Of a dragon

~

Slumbering

Deep within the earth

~

As if long before

I was

~

Or any were

There was a primordial birth

~

Murmuring

Before rock

~

Took shape  

And girth.

~

Moment of Hope

~

The light comes in the morning

          like a new creation

~

As the darkness divides

          and we see all that is good

~

All living things

          have their moment of hope

                      reaching high into heaven

~

And we like them

          feel the green shoots

~

Bursting within

          budding into new blooms of light.

~

In the Silence

When you climb a hill, you sometimes experience a special kind of silence.

‘The Lawley’ is one of the Shropshire Hills – seen on the top right-hand side of the photograph taken from The Long Mynd, also featuring ‘The Wrekin’ top centre left.

As you get higher in your climb, the views become more and more stunning, and the silence deeper and deeper.

It can feel like “a new kind of silence”.

This poem was my attempt to that experience one day:

~

There’s a new kind of silence

On the Lawley this morning

~

A kind of inner silence

On the Lawley this morning

~

As if a new kind

Of consciousness

~

Was slowly

Dawning

~

That has suffered

And died

~

And has risen

Again

~

Here on the Lawley

This morning.

This Amazing Gift of Being

Why do we have this amazing gift of being?

The ability to experience, to think and to imagine, to care and to love?

I love the words of a little-known writer, Thomas Traherne. He writes about the gift of life in a poem called ‘Salutation’:

1

These little Limbs,

These Eyes and Hands which here I find,

These rosie Cheeks wherewith my Life begins,

Where have ye been? Behind

What Curtain were ye from me hid so long!

Where was? in what Abyss, my Speaking Tongue?

2

When silent I,

So many thousand thousand years,

Beneath the Dust did in a Chaos lie,

How could I Smiles or Tears,

Or Lips or Hands or Eyes or Ears perceiv?

Welcome ye Treasures which I now receive.

3

I that so long

Was Nothing from Eternity,

Did little think such Joys as Ear or Tongue,

To Celebrate or See:

Such Sounds to hear, such Hands to feel, such Feet,

Beneath the Skies, on such a Ground to meet.

4

New Burnished Joys!

Which yellow Gold and Pearl excel!

Such Sacred Treasures are the Limbs in Boys,

In which a Soul doth Dwell;

Their Organized Joints, and Azure veins

More Wealth include, then all the World contains.

5

From Dust I rise,

And out of Nothing now awake,

These Brighter Regions which salute mine Eyes,

A Gift from God I take.

The Earth, the Seas, the Light, the Day, the Skies,

The Sun and Stars are mine; if those I prize.

6

Long time before

I in my Mother’s Womb was born,

A God preparing did this Glorious Store,

The World for me adorn.

Into this Eden so Divine and fair,

So Wide and Bright, I come his Son and Heir.

7

A Stranger here

Strange Things doth meet, strange Glories See;

Strange Treasures lodged in this fair World appear,

Strange all, and New to me.

But that they mine should be, who nothing was,

That Strangest is of all, yet brought to pass.

‘The Salutation’ by Thomas Traherne

He thinks about the gift of his body, of his experience, of having life itself.

He sees life as emerging from nothing – we each have our own personal “Big Bang” as another writer, Richard Rohr, said, and he takes it all as a gift from God.

I find it a beautiful poem. A poem that speaks to me about the beauty of the experience of life.

Life can be good when we are able to be grateful for each day of our existence, and gift our gift of being to others, as well as enjoy life for what it is.

New Blooms of Light

~

The light comes

in the morning

.

Like

a new creation

.

As the darkness

divides

.

And we see

all that is good

.

All

living things

.

Have their moment

of hope

.

Reaching high

into heaven

.

And we

like them

.

Feel the green shoots

bursting within

.

Budding into

new blooms of light.

~

dd

So Many Colours!

So many colours surround us!

It is June, and we are surrounded by wild flowers everywhere, in Shropshire and beyond!

Most of these wild flowers were just growing on the side of the road, or in a hedgerow, and how many times would we all have driven or walked past them?

And yet each is a tiny miracle all of its own!

Wouldn’t it be good to stop and gaze at these little beauties once in a while and be reminded of how beautiful this world can be?

A Beautiful Dawning

The world can be so beautiful.

I took this photo earlier this year, at dawn,of The Wrekin, in Shropshire.

The colours of the morning were so fascinating, and perhaps all the more special as they were constantly changing, and I knew that soon they would change from sunrise to morning.

I draw strength from the beauty of the world I see around me.

Maybe we all can?