As we move towards summer.

Today a speckled brown butterfly threaded a random flight across the path. Today She rescued the brightest lizard from a curious cat, placed it in the safety of an old stone wall. Bright frogs move in the grass, wait under primrose flowers, watch from the safety of emerald shadows and covet the warm places. Soon there will be snakes.

We curl in the sunshine on slates warmed to  soft smoothness by the distant fire way off in the sky.

Tonight is the fresh of the darknight. No moon. Only star light. And how they shine in a million brilliant shades of bright. Tonight there are aerymice, flit flicker and flash, darker shapes in a dark sky, silhouettes in starlight. And owls slow flap hunting the hedges.

Borrowed words.

Things that are wild.
The west wind. Waves at sea. Flames. Distant stars, so many. The bone white moon. Hawk flight. Firelight in a cat's eyes.

Things that are tame.
Being inside, listening to the wind outside. A still shore. Rainsong on a roof. The smell of baking bread. Firelight in a cat's eye.

Moth dance.

In the late almost dark of twilight gloaming we walked up the hill, shadowcats all. The lane held warmth still from the days sunshine. Once this lane was wide enough for a cart to drive through, but now walls have tumbled and gorse has grown to make a narrow path. As the dogs walk they brush the pollen from the heavy grass flowers and it rises like smoke.
On the way home we pause in the tunnel of trees to listen to the night. Leaves make mosaic patterns against a blue dark sky. Moths dance in their own light, flecks of the moon fallen to earth and their wings makes the faintest moth song in the stillness of early night. We are cupped in the darkness beneath the trees.

Sky dancers

Walking up the hill on a gray day, past the low cottage where Glyn is eating his solitary breakfast and up the emerald lane we disturb a family of four young ravens, newly fledged and full of the first joys of awkward flight. They rise into the wind and are tossed around in the turbulent sky while their parents sail on the ocean of air like anthracite bird ships, so in tune with their element, so sure and swift.
The parents dance with the wind, folding back wings to tumble in ecstasy, hanging still on the wind's edge. The young ones will learn how to balance the air on their soot black wings. For now they delight in their stumbling flight as we watch and wish for wings.

Still life with lizard and cat hair

nb: No animals or reptiles were harmed during the making of this image.

Maurice and the small striped bear of Britain

After days of blue sky we all woke this morning to a sky the colour and texture of the inside of an oyster shell, a pearly day, still, calm and quiet. We walked, just Her and me, over the hill, but our path was blocked by the wild ponies, so we skirted around them.

Brave as only a cat can be I stalked through the bones of last years heather flowers, and the ponies did not see me.

Across the hill I hunted, between tree and rock, a wild place. And then She thought to go an see the city of badgers. They would not be out now. They would be sleeping, for badgers are night time and dusk creatures. They would be sleeping, curled in their setts in nests of bracken and moss and their cubs would be curled tight too, for warmth and to keep away the dreams of daytime.

So, we followed the track over the hill to the small wood and the city of badgers and there were their setts and the signs of spring, scratchings and gatherings of clean nesting bracken. Closer I crept and She worried, for badgers are fierce and wild with paws so strong and claws as long as fingers. I stood, two cats tails away from one of the doorways, and secretly called.

And out came a badger, face striped and blinking. The badger ran from the one hole, skirted around me, down to the other, so shocked to see in the bright light of daytime, a creature coloured like the setting sun fallen on her doorstep. Too fast to photograph, as close as a whisker, and She so worried by the fierceness of the wild thing. I looked up at Her, and smiled a secret cat smile, and thanked the small striped bear of Britain for granting us an audience on this pearl of a day.

Black dog walking and the wild fox

Sunshine and gray sky. Walking with Pitta and Ffion. Black dog shines in the sunlight. The dogs picked up exciting messages and then on the rock we saw a fox, watching, keeping his distance, clear against the skyline. A wild thing.



We watched for a while and the fox watched us.




Later Pixie let Ffion carry her a little way and she chewed her fingers and kept her warm and made her smile.