Arnos Vale

On a bright Sunday morning in early October, I rode through the quiet streets to Arnos Vale, a large Victorian cemetery in East Bristol. I live only a 15 minute cycle ride away, but I had never visited despite best intentions, so when I saw a post recently advertising a mindful nature writing walk, it felt like the ideal opportunity. Our walk was led by Miriam Ricci PhD, who left academia in 2023 to focus on creative facilitation projects. We spent the first hour walking in silence, Miriam giving us gentle prompts at various points to focus on using each of our senses, and then sat in the community garden for a period of free writing. I decided to use these notes to make a poem. The cemetery is a beautiful place, grand Victorian architecture combined with absolutely wild areas. Definitely a place I would like to revisit.

Arnos Vale

Fingers outstretched, bumping along a lumpy stone wall
The soft breeze in the trees overhead
A large black cat, curled up on a headstone
Too early for Halloween puss
Spider season once again

Sparkling dew on blades of broadleaved grass
I am delighted to find it velvety soft to the touch,
Fresh drops fall from my fingers
Catching the sun that is still warm

As I move from light into shade
I appreciate the difference deep in my body
I leave behind the Merlin app and instead
Surrender to a serenade from unclassified birds
Call and response
I wonder what they’re saying to each other?

Red berries of all shades
Some scorching bright scarlet, best lippy style
Others dark and wine rich
Stores for the winter

Leaves are on the turn, some not true autumn
But instead burnt brown by summer drought
Sadness bubbles, and then the guilty relief
That I’m feeling joy to be here 
In this place, at this time
There is only now

Human-made objects puncture the skyline
A stone obelisk a mark stamped into the landscape
Some long-forgotten Victorian paterfamilias
Is suffering the same indignity as Ozymandias
Verdigris overtakes decorative finials
Lichens patiently colonise stone
Soft mosses creep
Ivy stretches out, wraps around
Delicate roots penetrating, pulling inexorably slowly
But pulling nevertheless, deconstruction is inevitable
 
Our walk ends in the community garden
A place full of care, many hands have tended
A dance with the living plants
Rosemary for remembrance, a transport to the past
Family recipes, cooked with love
Fennel seeds popped in the mouth
Sweetness, ticklish liquorice divides the group

One last gasp, a late butterfly
Pale against an orange plastic safety barrier
Light fawn, wings splashed with cream and darker brown
Autumn treasure, feel the turn
Time to move on

I didn't take any photos on the walk (too busy being mindful and present), so here is a bunch of luminous rose hips that I spotted in a front garden recently. This week I read Ursula Le Guin's classic novella "The Word for World is Forest". It's been on my wish list for a while, and I serendipitously spotted a copy in one of those little free libraries.

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