And there are too many things need doing for me to write much, so I’ll settle for a picture of this rather splendid creature I found in the garden this morning.
I suppose it’s a kind of tiger moth. (I should have stuck a ruler in the picture as an indication of scale, of course, but it must have been something over an inch long.) Its impressive camouflage would have been marginally more effective if it had chosen the cream painted wall for its morning siesta.
Continue reading “time flies”
Category: village life
immortal bird
At half past one this morning, I was tossing and turning, unable to sleep because of the loud birdsong outside my window.
I’m not at all good with identifying birds from their songs, but I’m pretty sure it was a nightingale singing from the cherry tree. It stopped briefly when I put the light on, but then, from what I remember – I did get some intermittent sleep – it continued all through the night until I was awake again around six. Gradually, as it got lighter, the voice was joined by others, and now it’s daylight, there is still much birdsong, but it is more scattered as they are all off about their usual business.
Continue reading “immortal bird”
spring cleaning
Outside open windows
blossom clouds the orchard;
my dustpan is full of pollen.
Alternatively, and more in keeping with the haiku spirit:
through open windows
apple blossom;
yellow dust on the floor
use your loaf
Bread is important in Spain. Not what I’d call good, but important, all the same.
The two loaves in the picture look tempting, but they are both basically cotton-wool-style white bread. The one on the left, bought as un pan, will be easier to cut in a couple of days, and will make quite decent toast. At first sight, a foreigner may think the one on the right – una barra – will be like a French baguette. They’d be wrong. It’s pretty much the standard tasteless Spanish loaf, though the supermarket version tends to be rather cheaper and even more like cardboard than the ones I buy in the panadería.
Continue reading “use your loaf”
april
While others bundle and bunch
under umbrellas, shrug
into pak-a-macs and hunch deep
into their collars, their faces
scrunched, gurning
against the elements, she
pokes tongues
at raindrops and laughs
glitter from her hair.
In the UK we are used to hearing that “April showers bring May flowers”, an expression that apparently can be traced to its earliest known form – Continue reading “april”
don't confuse the narrator 