We welcomed some new elders to our fold.
Not only was it spring, with birdsong, primroses, buds, it was also national poetry day. Blackthorn woke in us the rich vocabulary, its beauty and thorn the juice:
Japanese like, friendly looking blossom, strings of pearls, like snow across the hedgerow….
Crown of Thorns (or was that hawthorn?), ‘He lost his eye reaching down to take the blackthorn from his bucket, and declined ever since, living as an alcoholic in Bridport’; Yes, it is known as BLIND THORN. ‘I once knelt on a blackthorn and got a major infection’. Someone I knew died of a blackthorn wound. A witches wands were made of blackthorn.
What is the difference between blackthorn and wild plum? Sloe and bullace.
We also chose our favorite bird of this day – starling, robin, feisty goldfinch, Koel, a Hong Kong bird, lammergeier, an Indian Himalyan bird, woodpecker, green woodpecker, the much maligned pigeon, buzzard, wren, blue tit, and even a Diana Ross.
After such word yoga and a spot of great tapping, and inspired by Martin reading Wordsworth, we created our poems:
Blackthorn – Wrens and robins
Like snow across hedges
Friendly looking blossom
Home of the black hair streak
Egg laden in autumn
Sole food of the caterpillar
Slow fruit makes your mouth turn inside out
Transformed by gin to boozy jelly
But beware of the witches tree.
Magic imbued in black rods and wands.
It’s a defensive plant
He lost his eye
I once knelt on a blackthorn.
Knee piercer, tyre breaker, eye skewer, tentacular
Blackthorn – Blackbird Woodpecker finches
The Blackthorne blooms along the field
Its snow like clouds with blossom stilled
Its thorn impales with poison filled
Belying the suffered victims killed
Witches wands and wizards staffs
Its power and strength deals mortal blows
Blackrod resounds across the paths
With sheets of white to the hedge rows
We made eggs dyed with hibiscus and onion skins, and definitely heard the sap rising without the chainsaw backdrop!
We danced a ceildh around the fire whilst the climax ceildh band played jack in the green to welcome in the spring.
Colouful Holi celebration finished our day of hot cross buns and scones and we departed comfortable with time well spent amongst new friends and old. missing those who couldn’t be with us for the first day of spring yet ever grateful for our connectedness wherever we are!
Esther’s Goose egg gift
Caroline Way’s poem SNOWDROPS at Dunwich – homage to Wordsworth
Wordsworth & Way
I wandered lonely as the sea
that floats white foam upon its tide
when all at once what did I see?
a host of snowdrops far and wide
beside the waves beneath the trees
white heads dipping in the breeze
so scattered as the starlight shine
illuminate the milky way
they stretch in ever-winding rhyme
throughout the woods above the bay
ten thousand snowdrops at a glance
spread through trees in gentle dance
the waves below them danced but they
outdid the sparkling foam for me
a poet hears pans music play
whilst in such a fragile company
I gazed and gazed but little thought
the wealth that sight to me had brought
for now when on my bed I lie
in meditative thoughtful mood
they flash into my inward eye
that knows the bliss of solitude
so then my heart with pleasure could
be dancing in that snowdrop wood
as now my heart with pleasure will
be dancing with those snowdrops still
Kinda Forest School 