This piece was written nine years ago, just a few weeks after the death of my father. It marks a beginning of sorts, the point when my explorations into the lives of my ancestors became my own ‘journey’. Since then the quest for ancestors and stories has spread and deepened and there will be much more… Continue reading Who do I think I am?
Category: Reflections on time and place
On Ronas Hill, Shetland, in midsummer
Red stones aglow in midsummer sun on a rock set in a fishful, oil-rich sea, resting awhile, a little while, in the warmth, the calm here so rarely found. This rock, it seems, is very old and so far from its birth that it can tell of heat and cold, of collision and division,… Continue reading On Ronas Hill, Shetland, in midsummer
This place, that time….
Today is the thirteenth anniversary of my Mum’s death and it seems an good time to share again a poem written last year about the experience of visiting the place where she was born (Carlisle) and where her (and my)ancestors lived. During the past year I have discovered much more about our ancestors and the… Continue reading This place, that time….
Two poems reflecting on ancestors and our connections with the past and the future
Randomness to reality Shapeless randomness Yet to be formed Unique in potential Unique in form Unique in life Yet to be realised Randomness stretching through time and space Chance meetings and movements Slowly evolving to an ‘I’ Not an ‘other’ Each ‘I’ not knowing what it is producing or how it was produced ‘I’ is… Continue reading Two poems reflecting on ancestors and our connections with the past and the future
Life’s a long business!
This was my mother’s favourite saying as she got older and saw the succeeding generations make their way in the world. Life was quite a long business for her as she lived to be eighty nine. Having been born before the outbreak of the first World War she lived to see the turn of the… Continue reading Life’s a long business!