Yet more rain...

The weather report

It has been raining
constantly since
Friday afternoon.
More like an upright sea
with slots in it!

Better get a grip...



A beautiful grain in the rain...

Puddles...

Tonight, I have only the weather report...

*

Persistant outbursts of rain.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find EBTG 's great version,
but this will do just as well...

The Hermit Without A Home...

This short piece, although a continuation of undiluted feelings of a broken stone, is also dedicated to another hermit Nick Drake .. who tragically never managed to find home. One of the songs is a favourite by this immensely talented songwriter, and the other is written about him by John Martyn.
Both gone, but still shining ...

*

Clytemnestra, the wind is blowing,

On the quays of decorated bells.

Clytemnestra, the wind is blowing,

Have you felt the horrors of the war?

Do you know how to slide on the sweetness of my speech?

Don't you breath the same air?

Don't you speak the same language?

Clytemnestra, the wind is blowing,

Turn your back, cut off the wind.

Clytemnestra the wind is blowing

Turn your back, cut off the wind.

*

A broken stone, the hermit without a home ...

I could be here and now.. I would be, I should be, but how?

Frozen on time...

(Song for a rat)

*
I don't know ...
No, I don't know
Which way I'm facing

What this song's embracing

I can't grow ...
No, I can't grow
A single thing here
The blood is thin here

And as I look across this sad and frozen sea
I realise there's no one else here but me
It's written it in a bottle buried the sand
Will you hold it in your hand

I need you ...
Yes, I need you
To throw me something
To show me just one thing

I found home ...
Yes, I found home
But I lost my way there
Can I have another day there

And as I look across this sad and frozen sea
I realise there's got to be a shift in me
The truth lays buried in that bottle in the sand
Will you hold it in your hand

Can I have another day there
Just another day there
Another day there
*
A broken stone, frozen on time ...

I like this song written by the late Mr Marley, especially this version by Annie - also, I like this quirky movie (I know it's soft) because of what it represents.

Shouting At The Universe...

*

When does a journey begin and end?

There are many journeys within journeys. Recently I made a journey that was part of one, within another, that belonged to the longest of all.

Last Saturday, I was on my way somewhere far from the house, but close to the heart. After driving for many hours through a Christmas postcard, I had no option but to turn around. On the return trip, I had a puncture. I know it was not the most misfortunate thing that could of happened (I found out later, the hole in the tyre was the size of an old penny - the tyre blowing, especially in these conditions, could so easily of ended tragically... so misfortune as it turned out, it certainly was not) however, the sequence that followed would not of looked out of place in a sketch on Monty Python.

To cut a long tale short, everything that could of gone wrong with the simple task of changing a wheel did so and some. The jack that wouldn't bite, the frozen wheel nuts wouldn't budge, the endless slipping and sliding, and eventually stuck solid in the snow. These negatives are but minor inconveniences compared to the real horror that followed - being out in the freezing conditions arm wrestling with the wheel nuts for what seemed like an eternity, my ring of alchemy, and also close to the heart, must of slipped off my finger into the snow because my fingers had shrunk in the cold. The thing is, I didn't notice it was missing until I was almost back at the house... When I realised it was gone, the feeling was like a fever.

I began to think that losing the ring or it 'missing in action' under the present circumstances was possibly an inevitable synchronicity...

The universe was shouting - but shouting what?

Could it be a punishment for not completing my original journey?

Was losing the ring in the snow a symbolic burial?

In this state, is it a good time to think at all?

We don't listen enough when the universe is shouting.

We don't heed our own signs that's for sure. We don't have enough faith.

If we can't fit it into nice little logical box, or it's not something we understand, or are familiar with, then we often find it hard to believe. After all what is faith? It's believing in something we can't touch, taste, or smell, you just know it - that is faith.

Anyway, faith does have a purpose in this story of journeys because I have never lost mine, even when I was on the rack over losing the ring. Even though it is as thin as a weakened thread.

But the story, or the faith doesn't end there either...

Thursday, magic returned in abundance, even though I must confess I was of the opinion that this alchemy's powers were fading rapidly, if not already burned out completely.

Firstly, in the morning, I was moving some furniture for a good friend of my sons, and we got chatting and he's a searching for buried archaeological artifacts enthusiast and he offered to lend me his metal detector.

Gratefully and eagerly, I went back to the scene of the crime, and although it had been snowing on and off for the four days since I lost the ring and realised it was a long shot to say the least, somehow as I was driving again through the snow-clad countryside, I was full of enthusiasm, faith, and a surprising clarity and light that have been desperately absent during these many dark days.

So I arrived, and so did the magic - I took out the detector and amazingly there it was...

This precious ring had been buried in four days of snow and I had found it within four minutes.

When I started writing this on Wednesday, it was going to be about great loss.

Today, it turned out to be a different journey.

When does a journey begin and end?

All I know is for me, a journey can only end when all is done.

Into the mystic... the journey continues.

*

A broken stone, shouting at the universe...

Can't Touch The Water...

*

I sit here with these shackles

Through harvest moon and seed

We all make our choices

On a cross your meant to bleed

Clocks are barely ticking

Dry river flowing fast

Mirror glass is turning

As future touches past

Today I heard a cloud die

But it didn't make a sound

My thoughts about the sea

And of all things lost and found

They say there's always hope

Like in shadows there are stars

And I can almost touch her Venus

But these shackles are on Mars...

*

A broken stone, can't touch the water...