Creation

Poem: Jacob’s Dream and Awakening. Sunday Retold.

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Hello. This week I’ve been taking a look at the readings many churches follow on Sunday, and found something coming up this week that has sparked my interest, and led to some contemplation. A poem has emerged, as they sometimes do. I’m not sure I can say it’s finished, but it is settled for now, and I’d like to share it with you. Those who have been looking at this blog for a while – thank you – may remember that I’ve a thread running through it called Sunday Retold, which includes extracts from my book, The Bible Story Retold in Twelve Chapters.

Jacob's ladder

This beautiful illustration by Sophy Williams is from another edition of the same text, published as The Lion Classic Bible

Here’s my retelling of Jacob’s dream:

Jacob went alone, travelling until it was dark.  Shivering in the chill of the desert night, he took a stone for a pillow, and lay down to sleep.  As Jacob slept, a dream came to him.  He saw a ladder, with its feet on the ground, stretching up and up to heaven.  In his dream, he watched as God’s bright angels travelled up and down in between heaven and earth.  And in his dream, God himself was there……

Jacob woke with a jolt and looked around.  He was alone.
“God was here and I didn’t know it!  This place is the gate of heaven!” he said  Then he took the stone he had slept upon and set it up as an altar to God. He poured oil on it as an offering, and worshipped there. Starting out once more, he left his homeland far behind.

You can read the original here, Genesis 28: 10-17, it’s the set reading for this week. It’s a story which has spoken to many over the centuries, revealing depths of meaning. For me, this time, I was struck by the way comfort came to one who was a fugitive, who had lost all that was precious to him. It also speaks to me of how our perception can shift, and we can be illuminated with a new understanding, how we can find the simplest things holy.

Jacob’s dream and awakening

Night can fall suddenly
on the road, when alone.
Darkness sweeps in
like a flood,
and one who lived with
others, a dweller
among tents, is out
in open country now.

Alone, he chooses a stone
and rests on cold rock

And finds that to the fugitive,
the lonely, the guilty one,
dreams may come.
And company, too, of sorts –
strange, perhaps luminous –
angels ascending and
descending

And a presence, such a presence,
that is here, and now.
One who is above the angels,
and right beside him, and speaks
with that deep resonance
that comes through dreams.


Perhaps those away
from the knottiness and rush
of their own mind can
know that this stone,
and so every stone,
is the gate of heaven,
shining with oil.
That this place, and so
every place,
is where God is

That this dream-night
can change the day-heart
of one who walks away.
For even the stones have a
sheen of brightness now,
wherever they are.

From my companion collection, Prayers and Verses through the Bible

If you’d like to use any of my material, please feel free to do so, acknowledging this blog as the source. It’s always a great encouragement when people let me know where my writing has been read.

Poem – Wasp

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Firstly, an apology if you don’t like wasps. I promise this is the only photo you’ll see here. If you can bear to persevere and read the poem, you’ll see how I’ve shiften a little in my view of them, and I hope that might help.

Picture – Gedling conservation trust – Common wasp

Thank you for bearing with me as I took a bit of a break from writing here over the summer. I do hope to share more with you as the days shorten and outside is a little less enticing.

There are notes in my notebook, ready for some further sharpening of my pencil. One of the things that’s really struck me this year has been the absence of insects here in the UK. Wet and cold earlier in the year, while not newsworthy compared to other weather events, seems to have stricken many of our insects and affected those birds and bats who feed off them. I am pleased to see the garden lighting up with wings, late as it is, and that has lifted my spirits. It’s been a strange, unsettling time, though, looking at the flowers that normally draw bees and butterflies, and finding them empty. I’ve wondered when to cut the meadows down, and left it late, so the last flowers might provide something for these missing friends.

Earlier in the year. A feast spread, but where are the guests?

The Butterfly Conservation trust have just published the results of their Citizen Science Survey, and found that the numbers are very low this year. You can read more about that here.

It’s also been strange to enjoy picnics without being troubled by wasps. I have been suprised to find I miss them, and worry about how they’re doing.

And so this morning, I saw a wasp. One of so few this year. And I wrote this.

Wasp

This morning, eating breakfast, slow,
I heard a buzz and a tap against
the light-streaming windows.

Buzz and tap, buzz and tap.
I turned, saw a wasp on the window,
and felt joy rising, and knew how
strange it was to feel that joy
at the sight of her –
joy, and compassion, too,
as she bumped and bumped
against our shining window.

Oh, hello, I whispered,
Don’t be afraid,
you’ll be out in no time!

And, glass and paper in hand,
I released her.  She lingered
a moment on the rim,
gently waving her stinger
up and down, then spread wings,
flew into the clear September
light, bright with late flowers.

And I laughed.  Years ago,
I would have flapped her away,
swatted her even, afraid.
And here I was, whispering to a wasp.
Years ago, there would have been
hundreds.

Not this one solitary marvel,
striped, miniature perfection,
buzzing and beautiful,
in search now of the
sweetness of a fallen apple,
the ivy thick with bees.

Precious, so precious.
Late as it is, I am learning
how precious life is.

Edit: 11th November 2025

I was sent this film of the poem by Joseph Davidson. Do watch it, it’s very good.

Poem: The most beautiful thing, for Earth Day

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Monday is Earth Day, when many of us especially remember the gifts of the Earth, its fragility, and our responsibilities towards it. Today (Saturday) in my town we’re having a bit of a celebration down by our river, focusing on good local food and organisations which are seeking to care for our patch of Earth. There’s music and friendship and crafts and storytelling, and local businesses who are doing things differently – beautiful local bread and saffron and wild venison and plants and flour ground by our tide-mill among other things. It’s a good way to mark the occasion.

This spring, I’ve been enjoying Simon Armitage’s beautifully illustrated new collection, Blossomise, in collaboration with the National Trust. I highly recommend it. It’s a celebration of the blossom season, transient and determined, which for us starts in February with this lovely cherry plum, or mirabelle, and is carrying on from one tree to another in our growing collection of fruit trees. We have one apple who is always alarmingly late, but the buds are beginning to swell. Maybe by mid May, if its mild, it may offer the season’s swansong. I also highly recommend the beautiful Orchard by Benedict McDonald and Nicolas Gates – I sent a copy to my MP as a gift when she was Secretary of State for the Environment.

I have been thinking of the Japanese love of blossom, and how it’s fleeting ephemeral nature makes it so precious to them, and to the rest of us. In some ways, it’s a modest theme for such an expansive day – when we consider the whole of this green Earth, but I kept being drawn back to it, so here we go. I think what draws me to it is twofold: there’s something about the dazzling beauty of blossom which is so transient, so easily lost which reminds me of the beauty of all the trees, and oceans, and rivers, the great all of the good Earth which we love and are harming and are called to tend and care for. And secondly, there is the draw of the particular. When I look at the big picture, I am often overwhelmed and frequently despairing, and so I choose to focus on the small, the local, the actions I can take for the trees in my area, the bats who will soon be flying over my garden, the sorry state of my – of our – local river. So this poem I’m sharing with you for this day is, like blossom, small and light.

The most beautiful thing

Outside, the blossom is in full glory now,
white star-flowers, delicate as tissue,
on black, angled branches –
like a print by Hiroshige.

I gathered a blown branch
from the ground, and brought it
in to shimmer on my mantelpiece
in a tall green bottle.
It is the loveliest thing in the room,
the loveliest thing I might call mine –
mine, perhaps, not as possession,
but in relation – as in sister
of mine, the dancing blossom tree.

For dance she does as the
cold wind blows,
gusting and wild,
in a snowstorm of petals
that dress the air about her.

And sister she is too, although
the resemblance is slight.
We share kinship in
chilly breezes and soft rain,
nourished alike by this deep
dark soil, and made of it,
depending on the same
gifts of Earth for our
brief time of flourishing.
This felt kinship, truly the
most beautiful thing,

As like her, I dance in the
gusting wind, and like her,
I look for tomorrow
and the promise of sun,
and birdsong,
and I too hope for
the gentle buzz of bees
and the fruit that is to come.

Hiroshige blossom

If you are looking for readings for Earth Day, you might find something on this blog to suit. Please feel free to use my work, saying where you found it.

Here are a few suggestions, but if you search by Nature, Creation, Green, there will be many others

Gaia at Ely Cathedral
Enough
What might it mean, to live well on a dying earth
Rooted
I hear the song of the earth
A parable
The grace of seeds

I thought I might mention here a few podcasts I like to listen to – I’ll just name them as there are so many different podcast providers. A thing I am noticing amongst those who are working with the land and especially the rewilders is the most deep sense of joy, purpose and accomplishment. There is a rising change in our relation to the rest of the natural world, and perhaps a thing we can all do is cultivate a love and practical care of our place, and find others to work with. So, here are some listening suggestions….

The Jane Goodall Hopecast
The Knepp Wildlands Podcast
Rewilding the World with Ben Goldsmith
The Rewild Podcast with James Shooter
Learning How to See with Brian McLaren – latest season is Seeing Nature
Wild Podcast by Grange Project
How to Save a Planet (for a more North American emphasis)

A little tree rehoming scheme……Some of the saplings dug up from my garden and very kindly donated by others. I’ve passed on about 270 now to local people who are planting woods, orchards and hedgerows. Strangely, it seems to be a notion that has found its moment!

Happy Earth Day.
May the place where you live flourish. May the places your food grows be bountiful. May your air and water be clean and life-giving.

A poem for New Year’s Eve – Crossing the Blyth at sunset, at the turn of the year

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All the photos in this post were taken by my husband on a wild and stormy day at Walberswick.

The poem I’m sharing with you today was written at a previous New Year. We nearly missed the foot ferry between Southwold and Walberswick while out on a long winter’s walk with our family. It ran till sunset – and sunset was upon us. Today, I’m glad for this poem, glad I wrote it and by it am able to remember this magical evening at the turn of the year, the time we spent together on this Walberswick walk, and the strange feeling of being suspended between the two shores, the two closed gates, in the hands of the ferryman whose course was sure even though it seemed to slant so across the water.

So too with time, in the space between two years, when we look back at what has been, and look forward to what will be. We are glad to spend time with those we love, and perhaps especially miss those who are not with us. Love glimmers in this golden limpid darkness between times.

Perhaps in this space we can dream of a shore with warm, welcoming lights, with togetherness, with hope. Perhaps we may find we can be such a shore for each other, and keep lights of hope and welcome burning in the long cold nights.

May you have a blessed, happy new year. Thank you so much for your time and company on this blog. I value that gift very much.

I’ve shared with you another poem about winter walking along this shore, and a murmuration of starlings. Such an awe inspiring dance of togetherness. You can read that here.

Crossing the Blyth at sunset, at the turn of the year.

We walked fast towards the ferry –
nearly too late –
and saw the ferryman on the other side,
the gate closed behind him.
But we waved, and he came,
his blue boat a long wide
curve across the river.

Behind him the setting sun,
the treeshapes
black against the orange sky,
How beautiful it is.
He helps us on board,
offering me his hand
with nautical courtesy,
and then shuts the gate
firmly behind us.

So we thank him, and our blue boat
begins to churn those golden waters
rippling with a fast tide,
as we seem to hang for a time
between those two closed gates,
between those two jetties,
in neither one space, nor the other.
We are somewhere else instead,
where all is gold,
where darkness lies behind,
where the lights of the houses and
the wide-open pub are ahead of us,
lights that warm with the hope of welcome.

We are suspended for a while
in this Adnams-blue boat
with the diesel and the saltsmell
and the cry of the birds,
bathed in light, trailing
an ice hand in water
the same colour
as the light.
Here we are.
This moment.
Between two moments.
How beautiful it is.

COP 28: a small, local action – tree exchange

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I must admit to feeling disheartened in the run up to another COP, where the oil and gas companies seem to be seeing the talks as an opportunity to do business, rather than prioritise moving to cheaper and cleaner and more local alternatives. The powers that be sometimes seem especially powerful.

So here’s a tiny, smaller-than-David-vs-Goliath idea which is currently happening in my drive. Just in case any of you good readers feel similarly, and are looking for small but meaningful actions. There’s a lot of us who care, who want to leave the world in as good a state as we can. So, rather than despairing over what isn’t happening, here’s something that is. Mighty oaks from little acorns and all that…..

It all started a couple of weeks ago, when my husband came across one of our old neighbours digging tiny tree seedlings out of a council flowerbed. Unsuprisingly, he asked her what she was doing. She replied that a friend of hers had two acres she was trying to replant as woodland, and was looking for trees. Now, I express unease on a regular basis about the number of tree seed- and saplings I pull out of our garden. The squirrels are very keen on planting nuts, which germinate remarkably well for instance….. So, he mentioned it to me, and I got in touch with the lady with the two acres. I dug out all the readily available saplings, and began to collect them from other people. The first load of about 100 trees went to her, and to someone else who has twelve acres they’re rewilding.

I wondered if other people might have spare trees in their garden, so emailed my friends at Transition Woodbridge, who passed the message on. Trees are arriving most days, and another person has expressed a need for small native trees, especially ones suitable for growing in a hedge. Another friend also has a number of oaks springing up in her allotment. So we have more sources of trees, and more places where they can go. It’s always good when actions become collective, when people gather together and all do the little bit they can.

Now, who knows where this will go, but for now, I reckon we’ve easily been able to provide a new home for getting on for 200 infant trees. That’s not nothing. That is something. It’s food for insects and birds, it’s shelter, it’s improved soil fertility and water management, it’s less carbon and more oxygen. It’s one in the eye for despair, too.

So, here’s to taking the small actions we can. You never know where they might lead. In 100 years from now, those nine tiny oaks might be home to many creatures, having a profoundly positive impact on soil, air and water …. And carbon. Nearly all life on the planet is carbon based, after all.

Poem: A solitary shining drop

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Sedum, after the rain had cleared.

The practice of wandering – often around the garden – contines to be a a helpful one for me, quieting and contemplative. The practice of standing still and looking, too. Quite a lot of apparent “nothing” seems to be fertile ground, after all. Something catches my attention, as if it is saying: ‘look, here is something, a marvel, a meaning, a glimpse of beauty’. I am coming to think they are happening all the time, and what makes the difference is my openness to seeing, hearing and knowing them.

And so, when the sun broke through after the rain, I went outside, and sat on my coat, and looked. Some distance across the lawn, I saw a bright red light, flashing, and, curious, saw a drop of rain acting as a prism. I watched it for as long as the angle of light made it shine with colour. It called to mind two ancient stories – the burning bush, and the flood – from the Hebrew Scriptures. How the world is full of epiphanies. And again, I was in awe of the way the natural world – of earth and fire, water and air – invites us to listen, to pay attention, to wonder.

A solitary shining drop

Just now, I saw the sun
catching a raindrop as it
rolled so slowly down a
sedum stem, fleshy
and green.

It shone through red, rich,
neon and ruby, flashing as the
stem swayed in the breeze, taking
the drop through that one
ray of light, back and forth.

Then it suddenly changed
to the dazzling blue of cobalt
and lapis lazuli – oh, heavenly blue.
Heavenly blue.

Just now, for a moment, this
treasure made of light and rain,
this solitary shining drop
becomes a tiny shard of promise,
a slim fragment of the arc
that holds the sun and the rain.

It all speaks.  All speaks. In the
mind’s quiet, and in a flash of
brilliance that turns your head.
A gentle whisper and a
burning bush, both. 
A drop and a rainbow.
The world shines with
meaning, murmuring,
as the green earth is
drenched by sun and rain.

Poem: After the storm – October ’23

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Last Friday, during storm Babet, Suffolk experienced some of the most severe flooding in England. It was good to be able to stay home and keep in touch with friends, making sure they were safe. Many people have lost their homes, their businesses and their posessions. Tales of help and rescue are still emerging. Places that have not flooded in living memory have been badly effected. We are used to threats from the sea in this part of the world, but think of ourselves as living in a dry place, unused to severe storms. The climate is changing, and it is unsettling.

As I’m writing this, the next storm is about to arrive, with a weather warning for wind beginning this evening. The mild, even warm, air holds so much moisture, the trees are still in leaf, the roots in soft soil. This morning I hurried to pot up a whole load of tree seedlings for a friend of a friend who is planting a small wood nearby, and I marvelled at how easily they slid out of the earth.

This strangely perturbed and perturbing season of weather is full of beauty, plants and flowers still growing vigorously on the first day of November. The air is full of insects and birdsong. Frogs are hopping whenever I disturb the plants in the garden. As I sat in a patch of warmth I remembered some words of Robin Wall Kimmerer which I love, from a book I treasure:

“Even a wounded world is feeding us. Even a wounded world holds us, giving us moments of wonder and joy. I choose joy over despair. Not because I have my head in the sand, but because joy is what the earth gives me daily and I must return the gift.”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants

And as I began to write, that idea seemed particularly rich and right for the moment, and for always. What gifts we receive. I hope we can return such prodigal generosity, and care for the Earth. We do need the Earth to continue to care for us.

After the storm, October ‘23

There is a low sun
slanting gold across
all this humming green,
all this hidden life
whispering through
each bending blade,
and the birds sing loud
after the silence of the storm,
as loud and full as spring.

And the sun warms my skin
after the floods and the
rain and the rising dark waters,
and my skin is soothed and comforted
even as my mind is troubled.

What will become of us, what will
become of us all, as the air
heavies again with water, burdened,
and that water, fallen, heavies,
burdened, with brown earth,
for each year brings more strangeness.

And yet, even so, the light
drips with gold, shining
through translucent wings,
insects swaying in those
wailful choirs, in many
tiny flocks, rising and
falling in the gusting warmth,
more and more each year.

It feels so small, this heart-response
to so much perplexity. And small it is.

And yet it is something
to marvel at the beauty that
is still offered, daily,
to say yes, and thank you,
for the green overflowing of all
this life, and to tend within my reach.
To receive, to love, to speak,
to tell you even of these
rain-drenched dripping flowers –
look, heavy and ripe and bowing –
and dare to hope that in some
deep and barely discernible way
this care, this love, this joining of eyes
upon beauty, is the softest whisper,
almost beyond hearing, of
mending and healing and
knitting together,
stitched through with
golden, endless light.

This poem also owes a debt to John Keats, and his incomparable Ode to Autumn.

Poem: The grace of seeds

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As we come to the end of the Season of Creation, I offer a harvest of seeds.

I love the way seeds spread in the garden, finding new nooks and crannies to settle, new places where plants will grow and in their turn offer flowers to the insects, seeds to the wind and the birds.

As I was watching fluffy seedheads catch the breeze a few weeks ago, I felt my attention catch on the seeds. I felt that insistent “look!” which comes sometimes, and alerts me to some depth, some beauty, some meaning. It’s always worth attending to. And this time I saw the reckless generosity, the persistence of seeds, unfolding to me a truth about creation’s blythe insistence on hope. Each offering of seeds represents so many second chances, fresh starts, try agains. And the word forgiveness came to mind – as if the seeds were offering a chance of Spring despite, in the face of, the ways we continue to undermine and deplete the natural world. The seeds a sign of forgiveness, a chance to try again, an ever repeating offer of new life.

Some of you who have been good enough to follow this blog for a while may remember that I return often to the themes of the parables – the stories Jesus told – especially the ones that speak of the natural world. I love the way Jesus quotes the psalms to explain this mysterious teaching method – “I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world.” (Matthew 13:35) The Hebrew Scriptures tell of a vibrant world saturated with the glory of God, of living things being animated, and full of wisdom, if we will but pay attention. I hope to write more about that another time, but for now, I’ll return to seeds. If you’d like to read more about the parables and the seeds on this blog, you can look here and here to begin with.

The poem I’m sharing with you today is full of touches from the Gospels, and another day, if I can, I might unpack them for any of you who are interested. I felt the call to “look” was an invitation into all sorts of deep truths……But I hope the piece stands on its own, open to all who look with wonder.

But for now, below, the poem. It’s been one of those pieces that has revealed its meaning to me in the process of writing, that has felt like a discovery or an uncovering. I wanted to share it with you today, this last day of the Season of Creation. I hope I haven’t hurried it along too much – it’s been taking its time. I hope it is ready. We’ll see!

The grace of seeds.

Seeds are blowing in the breeze,
gentle, white and light.
Fairies, I used to call them as a child,
back when the world was full of seeds,
and butterflies, and glimmers of enchantment.

I breathe slowly and long
into all this ripening.
All this, all, glows with a deeper life –
light and colour under the skin,
shining with a song
of greening and ripening.

Each seedhead releasing a kind of
forgiveness that falls with the seed,
falls to the earth bearing
new beginnings, seventy times seven.
Life wills to live, despite all we have done.
Life uncoils again, and again.
I am humble before it.
Before the caterpillars on the toadflax,
the frog stirring beneath the strawberries.

The world is indeed full of grace.
We do not deserve these chances, again,
and again, and again. And yet,
deserving is not the point. Seeds fall,
it is the very nature of things,
and blow on the breeze. Each one
offering multitudes. It is the way of seeds.

Might this grace, one day, even today,
catch us in its loving web as the trumpets of
bindweed blaze out a song of liberation,
and the blackbirds tumble fearlessly,
hungrily, in the hedge’s ripeness?

For the seeds float still, and
the air is still full of enchantment.
Life whispers, it calls us, it sings to us.
Does it know we will turn towards it,
at last, wooed and wonderstruck,
and learn we belong, have belonged
all along?
We might, we may, we can.
Those dry seeds show us how.

All the pictures are from the garden – and the narrow strip outside the wall by the road, where I’ve been sprinkling seeds for years.

Poem: Gaia at Ely Cathedral

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I’m sharing this post again, September 2023, as part of the Season of Creation some Christian traditions are marking at this time. So many of us have experienced extreme weather conditions this summer. I write in exceptional September heat, surrounded by welcome green from earlier rain.

I hope you find this post a helpful starting point for contemplation.

Additional note, 24th September. I am delighted that this post has appeared at The Cottage, Diana Butler Bass’ rich and thought-provoking Substack, this morning. I’ve admired her work for many years, and it’s such an honour, and very exciting for me, to find myself in her company today, under Inspiration. It’s a profound exploration of envy and gratitude, and a reflection on the deep drivers of our climate and ecological crisis. It’s well worth reading and allowing it to do its inner work on us. You can do so here.

Original post, published 12th July 2021, emerging from lockdowns:

As we are beginning to venture out a little more, we thought we would pay a visit to Ely, and the vast indoor space of its ancient cathedral. They often have contemporary art there, which helps the old stones continue to sing, giving a new perspective on ancient truths. We knew that Gaia, an installation by Luke Jerram, was going to be there in July, and so we went and saw this beautiful, astonishing sight. The comparative emptiness of the cathedral space made it all the more powerful as it floated above us.

And as the space is vast, and it takes time to walk up to, around and beyond the piece, you do have time and space in which to allow the work to speak to you, to stir up responses, and to pray. I am sure that one of the intentions is to give us all an opportunity to experience something like “earthrise”, when the astronauts first saw the whole of the Earth from space, and how that shifted their perspective, and began to change the way all of us are able to see our home. The staggering, indescribable beauty of the whole called out my sense of awe, which sat uncomfortably alongside my awareness of the damage we are doing to our precious, unique home.

In the setting of the cathedral, as Gaia hangs in the nave under the painted ceiling which tells the long stretch of the Bible’s story, I found the language of repentance surprisingly, and helpfully, came to mind. Repentance both in our more familiar understanding of sorrow for wrongdoing, and desire to amend, and in the possibly more ancient meanings carried in the old texts, of returning home, and of undergoing a profound change of mind – a paradigm shift in the way you see.

Much of my writing celebrates the beauty of the natural world, how lovely, precious, and vulnerable it is. But sometimes, that love spills over into grief. So the old stones, and the old story, seemed illuminated by our current crisis, and, in turn, those ancient words seemed to express something necessary, and powerful, and, in the end, with the potential for hope.

You can listen to the poem here.

Gaia at Ely Cathedral

She seems to float, lit up with her own light,
slowly turning, blue and blooming with clouds
as we walk up, look up, small before her.

While above our steps,
the familiar painted roof
rolls on, telling its painted story,
from the tree, and the garden,
on towards this

fathomless shining beauty,
the ‘all’ that was so very good
in that beginning.
Now as she turns
we see how she hangs
below the story’s last scenes –
the gift of a beloved child
held on his mother’s lap,
held forward towards us,
loved and given and giving,
and the wounded golden king,
who gives still.

And below, below hangs the whole shining Earth,
dazzling, vast with sea,
turning and flowering with clouds
from the southern ice-shine,
melting although we do not see her weep,

And the land, those small green swathes
and swags, are dressed in white too,
a veil of vapour,
while the deserts spread brown
and red above our eyes.

The lands are small, countries
seem tales we tell.
What is certain is this one great
flow – ocean and ice and cloud –
and the unseen winds that bear them
through our blue, breathing air.

And the people stand beneath her,
lit by ice, and hold up their hands
as if to carry her, or hold her,
or save her from falling.

How beautiful it is.
How strange and wondrous
that we should be creatures
who live within so much living perfection.

And as she turns slowly
under the child and the king,
I wonder, what do those
familiar words mean now,
‘the sins of the world’,
as the stain of our reckless harm
seeps through the blue and green,
through all this living glory,

And is there any hope in our
waking up to beauty with grief
and loss, even as dust and ashes
float across the sky,
across us all, late as we are
in our repenting?


And is there hope,
hope that we might be granted
this grace – time
for amendment of life,
to tend the garden
with its leaves and fruit,
shining and greening,
to take part in the work
of loving and healing,
of restoration,
of making all things new.

Looking at Gaia from behind the communion table brought to mind the words of repentance from that service, and I was aware of my sense of what “the sins of the world” might mean was creaking open a little wider.

Poem: Matisse Cut-Outs, and a nod to David Hockney

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Matisse, The Parakeet and the Mermaid, 1952

I shared a poem with you last week – What the space holds. Writing that poem reminded me of the extraordinary Matisse cut-outs, imagining the negative spaces left when his scissors had finished thier task. I realised that I’d never shared with you a poem I wrote about those works…..

Tate Modern in London had a very beautiful exhibition some years ago, in 2014, of these late and astonishing cut-outs. I was deeply moved by what we saw and experienced. You can still buy the catalogue from The Tate – and other places too – if you’re interested. As ever, as a book that accompanies a major exhibition, it is a revealing and insightful exploration of the work.

A thing that struck me was the contrast between the photos of the frail but engrossed artist, towards the end of his life, and the vibrant, joyful celebration of life itself that the cut-outs embodied. The vitatlity of the art he created sang from the walls. Finding it hard to make art in the ways he had before, he developed this extraordinary technique to transform his relatively confined spaces into a paradise of form and colour.

I felt the deep wisdom of this response, this openness to beauty, to nature, to life as a whole. It seemed to offer a brightness that could illuminate our days.

Henri Matisse working on paper cut out. Undated photo. Getty images

Matisse Cut-Outs

The rooms are thick and warm
with people looking, in reverence.
There is a hush
as we move like pilgrims
through doorways
and spaces full of quiet light.

There are photographs of you, in bed,
or tucked in a chair, old and crumpled.
Yet, in your outstretched hand is that
long stick, tipped with charcoal,
drawing, drawing,
or a curling pile of paper at your feet,
unravelling from those black scissors.

When the outside became unreachable
you turned your rooms into a garden,
with swallows dancing on the walls,
and fig leaves, and pomegranates,
mermaids and stars.
You are covering your walls with
bright cut-outs that sway in the warm breeze,
lavender and myrtle, while you breathe deep. 

This is what you did
while pain nagged close,
while death grew closer.
You made the beauty
you could make.
You made joy visible.
You did not stop –
in the shadow of
so much destruction,
so much war-grief –
you kept the charcoal
and the scissors moving,
an Eden at your ending.

I thought again about this exhibition a few weeks ago when I went to the Lighroom at King’s Cross with my daughter to see David Hockney’s Bigger and Closer (not smaller and further away). I loved the way the projections immersed you in the work, especially the Spring pieces he’s been developing using an i-Pad. You felt the power and beauty of the trees bursing into life, the brightness of the green, the froth of the cow-parsley. I bought a book as a souvenir, Spring Cannot be Cancelled, which I’m currently reading. It’s particularly good at capturing the mood of lockdown in his Normandy studio, and the intensity of the observations of the arrival of spring that time of isolation and deep uncertainty generated.

I was wondering whether to couple these two art events together, I do hope Hockney has many more prolific years ahead to enrich us all. I do not mean to suggest that he is an artist at the end of his life. But it seems to me there is something in common between these two artists in the intensity, freedom and joy of their later work. There is a real clear-sightedness and poignancy in the appreciation of beauty, and an urgency too. There is a deep embodied wisdom and wonder which pours through to the viewer.

It reminds me of Mary Oliver’s “instructions for living a life”:

“Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.”