Poem 25. Writing Words For Weasels.

Head of Comadrito by Ruth Koenisberger

Winter is here and I am now on Poem 25 and in another lockdown, albeit now in the U.K. There have been too many distractions, some wonderful like cuddles with a new baby and dinosaur games with a three year old. Others have been nail biting as coronavirus cases rise here and the  American Election creates a cliff hanger. When will it all be over? We need courage and patience to know ‘it’ will all take its own time.

This poem is about weasels because a weasel is one of my main characters in The Call of the Wild Valley. But the poem touches on how we use animals to describe human characteristics and often to the detriment of the animal. Why do wolves have to be bad when their social relationships are supportive and for the good of the whole pack. Why do we have the phrase ‘weasel words’? Usage appears to go back to Shakespeare where weasels were thought to suck out the egg yolk from a shell.

‘I can suck melancholy out of a song, as a weasel sucks eggs’ As You Like It 1600.

However it may be thanks to Theodore Roosevelt in 1916 who used the words for the ability of humans to obscure meaning or fail to take responsibility with clarity and honesty in communicating. ‘one of our defects as a nation is a tendency to use weasel words; when one weasel word is used after another there is nothing left’. ( With thanks to Wikipedia and I trust verified)

I hope clarity can return to communication and weasels can be appreciated for their role in nature and ability to tackle rats.

Writing Words for Weasels

Weasels do not have those words

That deceive with tricks and lies

If weasels really did speak out

Would their words be heard

Above the human need to shout

About nowt, while a bird flies

Through a sky of sighs.

In creating my novel about the lives of different species in the animal and plant kingdoms of Navaselva, a weasel became one of the main characters. In many ways after I created the first chapter and a journey narrative I felt the novel began to write itself. The characters, the places, and the challenges faced seemed to fall into place. However, one aspect of my way of writing was to avoid speech, I did not want talking animals that would be too like humans. But I needed characters with personality and feelings.

Comadreya is the word for weasel in Spanish. I named the weasel this but then changed it to Comadrito when Ruth was drawing him. She wanted a more engaging name. At first I wrote with some distance from the character and in 3rd person omniscient ( this now seems to be an old fashioned style, if an all knowing narrative perspective). I now realise the need to engage the reader by being more in the point of view of one character.

The beginning idea came from a story told by our yoga teacher Juanjo. I struggled to understand the Spanish but this was about someone seeing a bird of prey lift up a weasel in its talons but then drop the weasel fairly soon after, possibly as the weasel bit the bird’s feet.

Weasels are known for their sharp teeth and ability to kill all kinds of prey. Much later after creating my bird/ weasel encounter  I  saw the iconic photo of a weasel on the back of a woodpecker. It seems both survived the encounter but the weasel was trying to kill the bird.

The smallest weasels, Mustela nivalis are very light, about 50 grams but are known for their need to eat a good percentage of their body weight every day. Hence their ability to tackle a wide variety of prey from small rodents to rabbits and large birds.They could be seen as opportunists, sharp, able to act quickly and fearless.

The first chapter of my novel begins with a weasel waiting on a rock to go on a journey of discovery. One of my two encounters with tiny weasels at Navasola was looking out of the front door and seeing a weasel on the rock by the olive tree. It seemed to look back at me but in its mouth was a mouse. I had to ponder the possibility that a mouse that I had recently released from being trapped in a large box in the house, had been delivered, tired and intimidated by its encounter with me, into the sharp teeth of the weasel.

These are some of the reasons I chose a weasel, a small enough animal to travel on the back of a large bird, an animal that can hide easily, but able to slip in an out of many different places in a quest for knowledge about a rapidly changing planet. Knowledge that can be shared to help all species adapt and survive. One of the main themes of the novel is facing challenges through cooperation and coexistence.

I have one more poem to go and it is ready as it is one I wrote for my artist friend Ruth Konigsberger’s exhibition a year ago. It has also been translated into Spanish and I hope to work on some of these poems and translate some into Spanish as they are very much about the flora and fauna of the Sierra Aracena.

I will also do a final fundraising on that post because the one I started at the beginning was time limited and closely connected to the London Marathon and losses that charities are facing in this pandemic.

Poem 20 And 21: Goodbye to Summer. Fly Well, Fly Safe.

It is the equinox, the official end of long summer days. It is thought that this rather than any change of temperature is the way the migrating birds know they must leave for Africa’s warmth and food. The swifts usually go in August but house martins often have a second brood and will leave as late as September. The bee-eaters gather together too around this time. At Navasola there have been storms so perhaps some are still waiting to go. Here are two poems to two of Navasola’s summer visitors. One who has become a character in my novel and this drawing of him by my artist friend Ruth. His name is Abe Apio and he flies north in a quest to find a cooler place for a Navaselva buff-tailed bumblebee.

By Ruth Konigsberger

Abe Apio the bee-eater of my dreams.

Abe Apio you never leave me

Your brightness stirs my words

As your story moves me to write

Of your struggle to save

Not just bees.

Red rump swallow recovering from being stunned and ready to fly off.

You Can Not Keep a Swallow in a Zoo

This child delights in her own toy zoo,

A gorilla and tiger stalking through

A mat of savannah tufted strands.

A plastic fence surrounds a zebra.

A lion lies down with a flamingo.

The sun beats through a round bay window

Of a neat corner house with stained glass

Swallows at the front door and on the wall.

All this made the warmth of summer kind

In a chilly northern seaside town.

And this child did not know

What she knows now.

You can not keep a swallow in a zoo.

Now she counts the swallows as so few fly by.

The ones with red rump feathers preened

Prefer these southern lands with barns,

And ruins of long ago times,

Where with martins and swifts.

Built nests under old tiled roofs.

With holes and  a rural disregard

For cleanliness that bleaches bare all life.

We thought some swallows might adorn our porch

But one hit a window and took a time

To fly again high enough to see

The windows of heaven

Where the ark is waiting.

Each poem conforms to my challenge to write 26 poems for the 26 miles of the London marathon which was not run this year and many charities have lost vital funds. A poem will either have 26 words and be haiku inspired or 26 lines. Each poem will be about different species found around Navasola.

My charity is the Royal Society for Protection of Birds and  their links with Birdlife International. Please help them help the birds that know no borders. Much work has gone on to protect habitats and raise awareness of the importance of birds to the balance of nature. The decline in bird numbers and in particular swallows is worrying.

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/georginas-26-challenge-i-am-going-to-write-26-poems-about-the-wild-flora-and-fauna-here-on-our-woodland-finca-in-spain-i-will-post-these-on-my-blog

Poem 15. The Pond and a Shining Moment. 26 poem challenge.

This is a poem about our pond which took a long time to create but now gives a lot of joy and a habitat for many and drinking water for the birds and bees. It is also inspired by Lilian’s haibun prompt for Dverse poets and for open link night. Hope all Dverse poets have a good summer break and a Happy Anniversary for July 13 th. Thanks for all the inspiration.

The haibun form consists of 3 short authentic paragraphs, not fiction and completed with a haiku. Lilian gives some interesting advice on using a kiku , a nature/ time/ season key word, followed by an insight. https://dversepoets.com/2020/06/22/traditional-writing-on-a-shining-topic/

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Pond and a Shining Moment

The thin walls of the old house crumbled as the digger gently pushed. Stronger wider ones needed to be built to hold up a new roof. The man with the digger was only hired for two days but he was willing to dig out a hole for a pond for an extra 80 euros. We jumped at the offer. We wanted a wildlife pond. There was no running stream here, all the water was underground, sinking fast through sandy soil in the torrential rains after months of Mediterranean drought. The pond was excavated and then I decided to dig, deeper and wider and bring wheelbarrows full of good deep soil to my new vegetable plot up the hill. An open air muscle building gym.

The pond was downhill but became an uphill struggle. For two years it filled with rain water and the second year was so full and overflowing in May but by September was drained and the lining destroyed. Wild boar had one too many mud baths with tusk marks slashed through plastic. A new plan was devised of a boarproof fence, similar to the one around my vegetable garden. There was also so much wild plum growing that without removal this area would become a dense thicket. We worked to clear and have been rewarded with a meadow of wild flowers and the beginnings of more life in the pond with its now very expensive aquatic liner. We hoped for the croak of frogs.

His joy this lockdown spring has been to walk down from the house to the pond. His walk now is slower, unsteady. A virus, some years back, perhaps produced this change. Or so the experts say, but they do not really know. Once able to walk far and work on our new roof, now, he struggles to walk any distance. But the pond beckons, and with binoculars and a fence to lean on, he looks intently around. First he spotted one frog and then another. They seemed to be keeping their distance. At last shining, shimmering in the light, perfectly camouflaged with their dark green back stripe, they have their moment, and we have ours.

Light falls on Lily
Bees buzz: slippery limbs
Entwine hold hope tight

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I will include this in my 26 poetry poem as a habitat for a variety of species including the Iberian frog, plenty of pond skaters, beetles, a lily and other water plants, reeds, dragonflies and lots of bees. The pond has attracted the birds for water and baths, including a flycatcher or papamoscas in Spanish. Around the pond there is now a real variety of many wild flowers.

Thanks again to Dverse poets who reignited my love of writing and playing with poetry.

I am half way through my challenge and half way to my charity target. Please follow the Just giving link if you would like to sponsor me on behalf of a wildlife, nature charity. The RSPB and Birdlife International.

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/georginas-26-challenge-i-am-going-to-write-26-poems-about-the-wild-flora-and-fauna-here-on-our-woodland-finca-in-spain-i-will-post-these-on-my-blogs

Daffodils In a Garden for Peace

I have spent this last weekend of March in the UK at Woodbrooke Quaker College Birmingham, and I wandered around the garden of many acres to find the different types of daffodils. I gave up counting. Some were very different, some differences were very subtle. Some were fading away or being eaten. Some were in their full glory. I was bounded by time and the need to return to the conference talks. Perhaps the daffodils reflected the topic of our weekend about Unity, Diversity and Boundaries. Although there were many different points of view as there are often are within Quakers there was a unity and peacefulness in the stillness of Meeting, Woodbrooke and its Quaker history.

On return I thought the daffodils and stillness should inspire some writing and Dverse poets hosted by Sarah are working on the Villanelle form. So I have given it a go. More on the form and the links to past poets at end of poem.

 

 

 

 

An Infinity of Daffodils

(Woodbrooke Quaker Garden, March 2019)

–

What are words worth when silence calls?

Too many views but 22 types of daffodil flower,

Pensive thoughts when a pale petal falls.

–

The worm that wriggles deep within us all.

Now frays the edges of the yellow cloud shower.

What are words worth when silence calls?

–

We gather together to tear down walls.

Dare we dare  discern eternity within one hour?.

Pensive thoughts when a pale petal falls.

–

Bright orange clothes a host of petals small.

Elegant trumpets ready to hide the pollen’s power.

What are words worth when the bees need to call?

–

To live in a way that no longer appals.

To hold in the light the insects’ last hour.

Pensive thoughts when a pale petal falls.

–

Is it God calls or some wormlike fear?

The fall of a tear, the lost peace of a flower.

Pensive thoughts when a pale petal falls.

What are words worth when silence calls?

 

 

 

 

 

https://dversepoets.com/  For  Dverse poets  this month there is the opportunity to try out the Villanelle form and read a range of these written by the many talented poets who frequent this very convivial and poetic meeting place. Why not have a go? Check on the link and then on Mr Linky at the end of the post.

Note the villanelle form has to have 19 lines with 5×3 line stanzas, finishing with a quatrain, all  with repeating lines and a rhyme scheme to keep to.

Past poets referred to of course are William Wordsworth and his daffodils and ‘pensive eye’ and William Blake with ‘O sick rose’ and the worm and ‘ to hold infinity in the palm of your hand, eternity in an hour.’

Daffodil Notes

As for daffodils, well the number of varieties that have been cultivated seems to be about 13,000. And the number of wild species from 40 to 60. But it seems this depends on how daffodils are categorised and there are different sources for this information. Still a staggering number as there are also so many hybrids too.

 

 

 

Daffodils are from the Amaryllidacae family, think lilies and one of the old names for daffodil is Lent Lily. These beauties seem to like to lighten up lent as the time between Ash Wednesday and Easter is when they are in bloom. It is thought daffodils are a mispronunciation of Asphodels, see those in a previous post. Perhaps also the English made a play on words with daffadowndilly. Narcissus of course is a name given to this range of species and Linnaeus decided on Narcissus poeticus when he began to classify them. They seem to be the poet’s flower.

Wild daffodils originate from the Mediterranean region and  there is a wild one we saw near our Navasola home in the south of Spain; the wild hooped daffodil. There is also a wild species in the U.K. that can still be found growing wild. The Wildlife Trusts have this link as to where to go. There may not be  the ‘ hosts of golden daffodils’ that Wordsworth saw in the  Lake District but it is good to know that the wild species can still be found.

Wild daffodils in the U.K. https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/where-see-wildlife/where-see-spring-wildlife/wild-daffodils
Small Wild daffodil, hooped daffodil,in Southern Spain in  early April2018

My outcome for the weekend was ….to enjoy: swinging high, walking and watching the geese on the labyrinth, a visit to Cadbury’s Bournville village and watching an amazing woman play the carillon bells. And the conference….threw some light on what unites us.

 

 

Lets hope Spring is not blown away by another cold spell and possible snow.

And let’s hope with so much political turmoil the beauty of nature can unite us and the stillness we can find within bring peaceful and positive outcomes.

Rhodes; a walking haibun tour!

I am in Rhodes with a longstanding friend who loves the island and visits regularly. More will follow on this beautiful place but I am prompted by Dverse poets to write a haibun about walking.  A haibun is poetic prose followed by a haiku. My friend and I have been fortunate to do a lot of walking together.

In youth, we walked and walked, together. Teenage talks and teenage walks to Barnes pond, along the towpath of the river Thames, across Hammersmith Bridge. We walked our children too into Manchester’s many parks and out to the moors of Derbyshire. We’ve walked in friendship for more than 40 years. And now I finally walk with her in her beloved Rhodes. And we walk and walk.

Walking the past. In the present. Future thoughts.

Feet walk over cobbled stones in narrow streets. Above, the eyes take in medieval arches. Thoughts of knights and maybe horses along the wider streets leading to the Grand Palace of the Masters. Castle turrets protected the Order of St John. Stones in piles from pillars fallen. Many battles fought, won, lost. Bright bougainvillea flowers adorn walled gardens within ancient fortress walls. Scents of jasmine waft with sounds of many voices from many places. Scooters dodge the wandering tourists. Greek homes still within the sturdy old town walls from where the deep blue of the sea separates the isle from the mainland mountains of the Turkish coast. So near. So far. Empires have come, empires have gone. This small island a jewel to hold.

We walk along the ancient stadium of ancient Greeks. As women we wonder on the nakedness of men running fast, in the past! No women allowed then. Except for one. The mother of a hero. The broken Acropolis with scaffolding speaks of the need to respect the past but greatness goes. We walk around the ruins of men and there lies the small dragon lizard, still and basking in the warmth of ancient stones. We walk through the streets of modern Greece, the new town, coloured by blooms. Concrete sore we reach a deep valley park. Rodini. A jewel from the Italian rule. Now forgotten, neglected but it’s streams flow with life. Small turtles, egrets, giant carp and butterflies. We cross broken bridges, pass by young lovers. Here the world of green enjoys the lack of human tramping unlike the famous butterfly valley walked through by the multitudes who yearn for green and to see  some wild thing ; the beleaguered tiger moth.

We walk over more pebbled mosaic floors into holy places. Two headed eagles symbols for the Eastern Church. The frankincense and gold of icon painting fill the spaces with a silent sacredness. Behind a city wall a gate opens up into the Jewish synagogue. We walk through this with silent acknowledgement of a persecuted past. Spanish sounds sing songs of their Sephardic roots from Andalucia; my home now.  We walk to connect. So few returned to their island home. Down by the harbour in an old Islamic building we walk past the hopes of new refugees from not so far but far enough across the gleaming blue and treacherous depths. Later, we walk high up a hill, along a path with stations of the cross. From the giant cross, we walk no more but watch Apollo’s sun being guided down to rest beyond the horizon of the west. How long have we got left?

Broken bridges show
The eternal flow below
Walk the heart to know

With love to Tigger our family cat on his birthday; Valentine’s Day. A tribute to the world of Cats.

This is a haibun for a very special love between human and animal. A haibun is a Japanese form of concise prose usually connected to nature as with the writer Basho and his  travel journey ‘The Narrow Road to the Deep North’ The haibun should end in the famous Japanese poetry form of three lines, a haiku. This though is quite personal and may stray or wander like a cat.  Thanks again for Dverse poets being the inspiration behind the form and Robert Frost for opening the first line of haiku.

Golden Days

Our golden cat departed from us on a Friday,appropriate perhaps as the Japanese call Friday, Gold Day. In the morning the cat and I meditated together and there seemed to be a deep glow and connection. He sat on my lap and purred a bit. As I came out of my silence he got up to return to his dying. We helped him a little. Autumn leaves were falling fast and there was rain, sun and tears. When the vet came the cat was calm and ready. We had to be too. I was strong enough to dig a garden grave. I didn’t think I could but he had given us so much strength. He had been a survivor but his hours on this planet are less than ours. Over my lifetime I have been blessed  with many cat hours, four cats, one  cat at a time. The black cat Blackie of my childhood I remember coming through the slightly open sash window of the Victorian terrace house from a small yard full of my mother’s flowers, honeysuckle and lilac tree,  to sleep and calm me in my room. The brown long haired one, Shandy, came when I longed for a cat when setting up my own home. She was from the RSPCA, abandoned, possibly pregnant. One Christmas the cat came with me from her Northern home to London but didn’t go back. My mother bluntly said “I’ll miss her more than you!” I gave in to my mother. My only kitten, the only one we named, shimmered with us in a pretty delicate way for three years until she, Shimmer went missing. Heartbreak round the local roads, searching, searching. Never knowing.

And then came Tigger, or Mr Tig. We never changed his name. Nana Violet knew some folk who couldn’t cope with a boisterous, bouncy, growing fast, ginger kitten. We knew we could and he came to stay and stay, through my daughters’ childhoods, teenage years to fully fledged human beings. He watched over them. He wasn’t always kind and his wild side loved to hunt. He loved his outdoor life, the garden, up the apple tree and round his block, over and under fences, across roads, and dodging Diwali fireworks. But most of all he loved the three of us.  And others too he would meet and greet. He managed Theo’s childhood with his loving but independent ways. She learnt how to understand cat. Through adolescence he maintained a careful eye. He would come in for the night! ‘Be more dog’ Josie once said. He purred on her phone. When the dog came he moved upstairs but soon the golden ones became friends but the cat food remained up high. We never knew his birthday but nominated February 14^th 1998 knowing then that this was a special love between humankind and the animal ones. He stayed with us as long as his body could for almost 18 years. I have written this tribute to Tigger today, Valentine’s Day 2016, a Sunday, always a special day for remembering those we love and hoping we all grow stronger in that Love of all loves. Life on Earth.

Nothing gold can stay,

But in this world for a while,

We must learn  to love.

 

 

 

 

Pelican Puzzle poem. Donde Estamos? Where are We?

Willow and Gingko

Am now in a very different place where there is sea all around and halfway between the USA and Europe. We are on holiday for Trevor’s significant birthday. However, this poem was written a little while ago  and was inspired by a walk in a famous park. I love many of the prompts given by Dverse poets prompts This one was about the surreal in the ordinary. The climate talks were also going on at the same time. It all felt quite surreal particularly as I recognised the Spanish words of a small child. I also wanted to do this walk in response to the blog  A Wildflower’s Melody.A wildflower Melody I love the serendipity of blogging. Also check out some amazing poems and advice, examples and interesting folk writing poetry for the Dverse Poets bar. http://Dversepoets.com I can’t keep up with it all!

 

Donde Estamos?   Where are We?  or  Pelican Puzzle Poem

 

Donde estamos a child says on a bridge

Crossing with his father near the edge

Familiar sounds in unfamiliar places

Familiar faces from high mountain passes

 

Donde Estamos?

Where are we?

 

Diverse ducks on rippling waters

Wild grey geese fly into land

Wild and tame take turns to feed

Clipped wings that long to be freed.

 

Donde estamos?

Where are we?

 

 

 

 

Diverse trees some bare, some dressed,

With gilded leaves at some royal behest,

Weeping willow leaves green may last

Next to the far flung Gingko holding fast

 

Donde Estamos ?

Where are We?

 

Black fisher birds perched up on rocks

Herons looking down form weather cocks

Cottage house with surely, organic veggie plots

Fresh fish arrives in plastic pots.

 

Donde Eastamos?

Where are We?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Great African White in grey December Park

Whose wingspan could rival the albatross

Grey squirrel on a grey man’s long grey arm

The wild we tame with foods ever constant charm.

 

Donde Estamos ?

Where are We?

 

 

 

 

 

Wild eyed Pelicans look down the lake

Pink footed geese fly past their palace.

A dull sky with flights of fancy passes by

A skyline of roofs with power to make us cry.

 

Donde Estamos?

Where are We?

 

Overlooked by one all seeing Eye

Chopper birds also above us in the sky.

Surveillance city sees us all, weather indifferent

To human fair or peace for species in our care.

 

Donde estamos?

Where are We?

 

A small sized beak cries out in hope

By a puffed up pigeon on a post.

Ancient birds with strange design

Greet us with a knowing look

Open up capacious beak that must be filled.

Talks and more talks, but act we must

Who are we to turn our backs?

 

Who are we?

 

Where are We?

Donde Estamos?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Will be busy celebrating Trevor’s birthday and then travelling back from another rather surreal place.  Let us know if you know anything about where these Pelicans are or hopefully just enjoy the poem. Thanks again to Dverse poets for all their prompts and inspiration.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clear Skies, Bright Stars. Advent and Hope for Peace.

Here is a seasonal post inspired by  Dverse Poets and the stars.

We are now back at Navasola and although the stars and the sun do shine very brightly here I will miss being with my daughters this Christmas. It will be our first Christmas outside the UK and our first at Navasola. We were first greeted in Seville with grey and overcast skies; same as in London and other parts of the UK over the past month.Today the sun has come out bright,warm and strong and with the clearer skies the stars too are shining bright in the very dark skies we have here in the Sierra Aracena.  The viburnum tinus berries are metallic and bright. A Sardinian warbler, great tit and jays were gathering food by the house and now and again a butterfly flies by! The vultures also enjoyed the thermals when I was out on a walk with Lotti and Ruth. See post on Autumn for Ruth’s photography and links to her art work. She inspires me to draw!

We are looking forward to finding out more about how Christmas is celebrated here and in particular the Feast of the Kings on the 5th and 6th of January. Here there are processions showing this part of the Nativity story and children get presents.

It is the end of another blogging year and I have been inspired by so many of the links made to Navasola through nature blogs and many others now. I have managed to read some books by Opher Goodwin and in particular Anthropocene Apocalypse and Ebola in the Garden of Eden. Both very good reads and with current concerns about the future of our planet. Opher Goodwin

 

I am also glad to be linked to Dverse poets who have managed to spark some poetic muse in me. The poem below is inspired by poems by Victoria Slotto and Bjorn Rudberg  about the stars. I have also linked to another poet Malcolm Guite and bought his book with poetry for Advent. These have inspired me to write this poem about the stars I saw above Navasola in the summer months.

Stars over Navasola

Above the silhouette of trees appear a clarity of stars
Numinous and numerous I search for one.
The childhood star my father saw I saw.
The Pole star’s perfect North still guiding some.

 

The wizened faces of the chestnut trees with me stare,
Abandoned olive branches touch the sky I seek to name,
With virtual app- titude we see the lights of Vega and Altair,
Bright threesome pulse with Deneb and the flighty swan.

 

An owl sounds out from Navasola East.

The moon still hides behind the hill.

Through the dark of earth and sky, wander many a beast.

Summer sounds and warmth surround me still.

 

 

Now in December’s dark chill drawn days,
Advent’s hope casts doubts on the prophecies of stars.
What and where is that bright star, the magi say?
How much to know, how far to go, to go, how far?

 

 

 

Inspired by Keats,gardens, and a poetry workshop by Daljit Nagra

The peony poem in one of my previous posts inspired me to try out a poetry workshop at Keats’ House during the Keats’ festival. I was also interested to find out that the poet Daljit Nagra was to take over as poet in residence there and was leading this workshop on how to write an ode. I have followed from a distance Daljit Nagra’s progress from an aspiring English teacher in a school I worked at to an inspiring poet and much quoted now from many GCSE anthologies. He is a truly modern British poet and very innovative not just with ideas but also language.

We attempted a Sapphic ode and this meant we had to be concise and focus on a tight structure. This was to be the slightly longer length of 11 syllables to 3 lines and the fourth line with five. Instead of a more traditional 10 syllable the 11 suggests a more ‘falling’ tragic tone.  We were introduced to terms used for poetic structure but the focus of this ode was to address a person with a sense of absence, loss, time passing.  As an example we were shown a modern ode written with this structure and the example was very moving but also was inspired by a poet I was introduced to when I stayed in Karachi in 1984. Faiz Ahmed Faiz.
We had to go and sit in the garden of Keats house and had about 25 minutes to write a Sapphic style ode! My mind was filled with so many memories of Chris Abbas and her garden in Karachi. It had lovely trees and flowers but also a little white dog, a parrot and a turkey she had been given for Christmas and had kept rather than ate. The dog inspired my Jabbu Jabbu stories. His name was Jabbu and he was a cheeky miniature Samoyed type dog. Chris was a trained artist from the Slade school and she had met her husband, Ghulam Abbas, an Urdu short story writer, in London. They had had three daughters and lived in Karachi but sadly she had recently been widowed. She had invited us to stay with her while I was volunteering to help children learn to read. She had many inspiring artistic ways of helping children draw and trace letters.

All of theses memories were flooding into my mind and I had to cut out so much in order to write an ode to her but the parallel of sitting in an English garden and enjoying time with her in her Karachi garden seemed to be the focus. I was able to feel I finished an ode and reading it out later at the workshop it seemed to work. Now as I reflect on it and have more time to count the syllables accurately I am not so sure! I also feel I want to slightly change the structure by adding just a few more lines! Writing seems to be such a difficult art as there are many ways to express ideas but it needs to feel right or fitting.
The poem isn’t quite ready yet but is an ode to her and her inspiring and diverse garden. In the blog are some pictures of Keat’s house and garden and it is here that he wrote some of his most famous poems in his very short life. The window view is from his upstairs study.

 

 

A poem for Peony: The Wild Peony Forest; cycle of change from March to May, paeonia broterii,

Dverse poets have suggested a prompt based on ecopoetry. Do check out this inspirational poetry group at  Dverse  . The poetry bar is open and serving up so many different ideas most of the week. Ecopoetry seems to be a different term being introduced by groups such as Green Spirit and Resurgence. Alice Oswald is also mentioned and I find her a fascinating poet who has such an observant style that also brings out deep emotions. I’m not sure I want my own writing to be put into a category and I had never come across this term before but I certainly seem to be focused on my own and others relationship with the natural world at this point in time.

Trevor organised a nature course here some years ago and it was led by the botanist Teresa Farino. This started my inquiry into the plant kingdom. I was also given a mother’s day present of the Alice Oswald anthology, Weeds and Wild Flowers.  I loved the Snowdrop one ,’ A pale and pining girl,head bowed, heart gnawed’ ……. ‘ her wildflower sense of wounded gentleness’

I wrote this poem early on in blogging inspired by the wild peonies here at Navasola and in the Sierra Aracena. It is January 2016 now but on our return from our special birthday trip to the Azores within 10 days there have been changes. The invasive mimosa is out in its bright yellow headdress, the almond blossom is delicately feeling for the early bees, and the peonies are beginning to thrust through the cold ground. Some are near paths so I stick sticks around them so we don’t forget and tread on these wild sisters of the many cultivated ones.

 

A Poem for Peony and all those wild loving sisters

Ms Peony Broterii

Wild genes live dangerously

Not cultivated carefully

Like your gardened sisters.

But your barb is in your poisonous roots,

Anchored, aching deep in chestnut groves,

In the shade of veteran friends, long standing,

Bringing you your strength, uprightness, roots rooted.

Unlike the myriads of visitors ready to be satiated

In your open sensuous bloom.

Bringing a light touch on velvet petal,

A rubbing of stamens, a staining of pollen,

Buzzing bodies beating,

Intoxicated with your nectar.

They stay only for their own satisfaction.

You may have some regrets, a sense of loss

As petals fall and breezes betray your beauty.

But your thrill is in your seed pod,

Ready to ripen, always ready,

To begin again, always hopeful

To survive into another Spring.

Only the danger of the human mind
Can threaten you.

Georgina Wright

 

 

Mid May, seed pod, ripening and hopefully fully fertilised by an amazing range of insects that have loved being inside this peony!

Part of peony forest in full bloom – April to May

Early May

Pollination, fully open to the sun and all insects!

The first Peony bloom in Navasola East, by an old chestnut, attracting insects. April.

Wild peony forest –  Early March.

Peony Plot in Kew gardens.
Over 30 different types of peonies and now reclassified!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Link to Dverse   For the ecopoetry prompt  January 2016

With thanks to the poems by
Alice Oswald, Weeds and Wild Flowers ( Faber and Faber ) and to the peonies and photos taken at Navasola among the ancient chestnut trees.

Originally written in 2013 and posted then.