Jumping Vlad Flash

When I was nine or ten years old, at school, I vividly remember ending a game of chess that I felt I should not be losing, by tipping up the board, I can understand why there are suddenly leaks appearing in the marine sections of Nordstream I and II. Fortunately, at that time, I was below the legal minimum age to buy nuclear weapons. 

The Wand, the Hat and the Hand Grenade

One of the universals of the interviews with the great, good or utterly insignificant appears to be that they all remember when they met Her Maj. I do not. I'm pretty certain we both attended the same flower show on at least one occasion, and I may have glimpsed a small but regal lady being mobbed by the adoring public, but it's not an image I can draw on with any certainty. It's not that I'm generally forgetful, I met her daughter, in a coffee shop, and I thought: "Why the long face?" and felt ashamed of that.

But the television is on. I've mild Covid symptoms, so I'm not about to impose my presence on the rest of the world. Talking heads, marching bands. I have time to reflect, and to wonder.

I wonder if BSL is really so full of downwards gestures, or whether it's just the topic, for example. I wonder what will be on the telly tomorrow.

Gatekeeper, Fritillary, etc

The area of garden that I cultivated last year is tall with nodding verbena bonariensis, not because I have cultivated them, but purely because I've let them grow, removing what I consider to be weeds. Amongst these tall stems are samples of broom rape, mallow, foxglove, and other cottage garden specimens. If you look carefully there's still some bramble and bindweed.

Attracted to the view outdoors this morning by the fluttering of a large and orangy butterfly, I stood and watched a while, to try and work out which of the fritillaries it was, and spotted a crisp, new gatekeeper. There have been a couple of weeks of meadow browns already, so it's no surprise, despite the difficulties of predicting a season that has been dry and occasionally cool, before the current warmth and sun.

Wordsearch

Sat with a wet pen.

A postcard to say Goodbye:

Sadly missed, my love.

FNFDF

 I call: First New Forest donkey foal, yesterday, just East of Beaulieu.

And a young blackbird in the garden today.

On The Sea of Green

My garden dinghy sits atop its trailer on a wave of deeper grass, where the pigeons don't graze.

Around its prow, the sun brings out ripples of daisies and speedwell, like the sparkling reflections of light on water.

Cradled on a soupy sea; in still motion.

I wasn't ready

 Dad died two and a half weeks ago.

Bird count, but not like this

Walking North (first time in a while), the place is overrun with redwings and wrens.

Tens of wrens.

More wrens than round robins.

Not a goldcrest to be seen, but a couple of tree creepers. And nuthatches were heard.

On the way, I saw a crow with white in its wings,

on my return a jackdaw with white highlights along its finger bones, like a flying skeleton bird.

Not

 I fell asleep again at five, imagined dialogue fading in my mind, ideas to write.

Awoke nearer nine, strident light of a frosty morn oosing through the weave of my dark curtains, gold and silver; pleats of smoked mackerel skin.

Now I close my eyes for meditation's visions, to find an auditorium of folding chairs in a tornado.

Clatter, clatter.