Rose

I've not posted much of late; I've felt stuck and without much to say.

But the rose plant featured in this post is looking quite splendid now and the other day when Dave came into my study (where I've moved the rose so as to be by a sunny window) I noted his intake of breath. Then I got the following in an e-mail from him:

'My love - thank you for bringing our rose back to life. It took my breath away, and triggered a memory of these words, which - coincidentally? - also echo with my memories of traigh bhan and the song that Niels loves to dance to. The rose is what pulls it all together. D xxx


We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Through the unknown, remembered gate
When the last of earth left to discover
Is that which was the beginning;
At the source of the longest river
The voice of the hidden waterfall
And the children in the apple-tree
Not known, because not looked for
But heard, half-heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea.
Quick now, here, now, always –
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flames are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one.

T.S. Eliot
Little Gidding'

I went to see Tim Pickles in Keswick on Monday. I am till resisting not knowing what to do, but again, like in February, a shift into accepting that things are as they need to be is sort of there. Spring seems to be here and I need to play!