Melting pot 10

Yes!! It's been a long while. But I've decided to post a Melting pot regularly again. So, here's some of what I've been feasting on in my spare moments.

• On my coffee table - new read Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel and a re-read of Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
• On my music stand - Chopin Waltzes and Bach's Partita in d minor for solo violin
• On my iPod - Melting Pot by Zoe Rahman
• At the allotment - hyacinths, daffodils and the first peeping flower heads of purple sprouting broccoli. If it keeps on being rainy and mild, it should be coming to my plate very soon!

About to have a break from the computer for a few days. Back soon.

Happy Easter!

Resident

He doesn't mind us visiting. We do the digging.

Lucky to catch a shot of him. He was off again before I heard the shutter click. Busy collecting grubs to feed his new chicks, he's checking our diggings to see what delicacies we have unearthed for him.

I peer into the wet soil, see nothing wriggling except for a couple of healthy looking worms. Not his take-away of choice. But he spots the tiny white grubs he likes and gathers more and more into his mouth. No time for singing just now.

As I walk past the hedgerow, I hear the well-fed brood are in good voice.

Bookcrossing

I had fun hiding some books around town the other day, setting them on new adventures.

City Reads takes place each Spring, with lots of events celebrating a chosen book. This year's choice is Ian Fleming's From Russia With Love. So, I did some bookcrossing at the weekend, leaving books for new people to find by surprise.

I left one at the station so I'm hoping it might have made it out of town.

Last year, I was pursued a couple of times by people who had spotted me "forgetting" my book. They just didn't want me to go home without the copies of The Book Thief by Markus Zusak that I was trying to leave beind. So I had to be a bit more sneaky in my choice of places to leave them.

If you see a book on a bench in the park, left behind on a table at the coffee bar, or sitting in the train by itself, then it is probably meant for you.

So, go on - it's yours to read. And when you have finished it, pass it on to a new reader, or leave it somewhere unexpected for the whole adventure to start again.

Blitz those weeds

Just a week after I posted their first budding, these dwarf daffodils have burst into flower. So lovely to see them. I posted a snap of them in a recent post here if you want to compare the progress of our Spring.

They don't seem to have minded being splattered and battered by the rain bouncing up from the soil. Nor did we, as we went to do some weeding on Saturday afternoon and stayed even when the rain beat down! Are we mad? Err...maybe.

I got into one of my "blitz those weeds" moods. Here's a shot of the rhubarb bed afterwards. Besides the leaves you can see, there are also a number of tiny red hearts ready to push up shoots, so I'm hoping it won't be too long before we can bring some stems home.

The next bed down from this one has 4 blueberry bushes and then there are 2 gooseberry bushes. They are just breaking into leaf, so no surprises that they got the weeding treatment as well. Something so very satisfying about that lovely black pristine.

Lost in music

the spaces opened up

drifted in

like muslin caresses a breeze

at a window open to the night

silences fell on us

like sea mist

dampens the cheekbones

we let her find the way

in the dark

followed her lead

as she carved a swaying path

through the high meadow

that hid us

after we had passed

***

I'd forgotten how much I love encaustic. It's been a long time since I last made some pieces, but I had fun doing these.

Goodbye Hz

He'll still be listening in when I play music and generally hovering around the place, but sadly, my blogging sidekick Hz has decided it's time to say goodbye to his blog later this week.

He has given "Fly on the wall" a fair go of it since September, although I know his interest waned in recent weeks. He had wanted more of a response from his readers rather than being left feeling he was talking to himself, wanted a bit of input from "out there" to help direct his new posts.

I can see that it's time for him to "buzz off" as he calls it. It has reminded me that you don't find things out unless you try them and I'm hoping that he will soon be enjoying new ventures, wherever they might take him.

He's here beside me now telling me what I need to write next.

He says xxxxx to his followers. Love, Hz

I'm saying xxxxx to my followers as well because you make a real difference. It wouldn't be the same without you reading and commenting. Love, A

The onions are in

I'm always happier once I get the onions into the ground. Much later than it has been in other years, but still a job well done. So much of the plot seems so bleak that I was looking at the woodpile for colourful inspiration.

Taking one layer of coats off seemed like such a treat in the cold wind, but look -

On their way. The bulbs are finally looking like they really are making a go of it. The elder is showing the first signs of leaf. The rhubarb is about 4 inches high. Can't wait for that first crop. The blueberries and blackcurrant bushes are covered in buds and it felt great to do some digging and to see that the worms survived the Winter.

Drawing in the dark

Screens played old cine films in the darkened hall of Fabrica Gallery. A dancer was creating poses and movement in response to them. She had charcoal clipped to a pair of gloves so she could draw as she lay on the floor. And if I'm honest, I wanted to be her, dressed in her white body suit, letting her limbs do the drawing. It looked so wonderful. And of course, the white clothes looked great when she had finished, although they won't ever be the same again.

All very wonderful to observe, but even better to take part in. All the drawing materials were provided by Fabrica so that you could spend time drawing in the dark to your heart's content.

I loved watching the anonymous of busy drawings being created.

It was almost a dream kind of set up with layers of images and reality blurring in the dimmed light. There was a moment when the kids on screen seemed to laugh right out of the image rush into today and another dancer joined in, joyful, to make shadows. Something touching about how these old family shots inhabited this space.

I really don't know where this week has gone. Good busy. A long clifftop walk, a poetry and music improv collaboration, some of my poetry being read to a new audience, digging the bean trenches and filling them with compost, buying onion sets ready to plant next weekend, lying in the sun on the one afternoon it was warm enough to do such things, and I just made the most delicious pasta sauce ready to have when I've finished work later.

March flooded in with 8 days of sunshine and look what happened.