The Echoes of Spring

At the break of dawn, I heard the hollow sound of the sea. I know it was not spring that roared outside. It was a primitive sound drawn from the depth of the ocean like the sound of chorus, sufficiently strong enough to lift the roof of a theatre. Through the half-open curtains, the sun came into my bedroom but it was a pale and silvery sun like a delicate moth exiled in a corner of the dusty room.

A soft grey morning for a quiet introspection after looking out to the sea from my window. During this Easter weekend, I'll pick daffodils and make floral arrangements and place flowers throughout the house.

The air was so full of sturdiness and zest that the first timid signs of spring, daffodils and snowdrops took shelter under the low branches of the trees in the woodland.

 

R. S. Thomas is my favourite Welsh 'priest-poet'. I treat poetry like prayers, to be said as the first words in the morning and the last thing at night everyday.  

I made a cup of tea and toast for my breakfast while I read poems by R. S. Thomas and listened to beautiful art songs from the album titled Modern Times (2012), sensitively performed by Christian Immler (German baritone). The exquisite poetry and language of R. S. Thomas, combined with the elegant and mellow voice of Christian Immler take me further away from the mundane drudgery of everyday life.  

Image credit: Christian Immler - a marvellous German baritone singer. I first heard his beautiful voice on BBC Radio 3. He sang a song by one of my favourite composers Walter Arlen, born in Vienna in 1920 and forced to leave after Hitler’s 1938 Anschluss. Christian's performance of Walter Arlen's songs took my breath away.



I'm listening to his CD called Modern Times with the superb pianist, Helmut Deutsch. It is available on here. Christian's voice is perfect for German and English art songs by Korngold, Schreker and Hans Gál, especially his effortlessly beautiful rendition of Gál's Abend Auf Dem Fluss. Image credit: Christian Immler (via singer's official website)

After two days of persistent rain and cold winds from the sea, I longed to go out for a long walk in the countryside. I suffered from the cabin fever after a prolonged period of hibernation inside the house. Suddenly I heard the words from my mother whose saying is based on her lavendered philosophy that ‘fresh air and exercise’ can cure most illnesses.



Antique box of cards with a notepad and a pencil for keeping scores when playing bridge on a ghastly rainy afternoon



Fancy a spot of bridge?

While I waited for the rain to stop to go out, I listened to my favourite music. I collect old music sheets and album covers from the jazz age c. 1930s. I love their typography and graphic designs. They exude the art deco glamour if you frame them. This is a famous song from the same era and my favourite version of this song is by Nick Lucas (1897 – 1982).

I love the voice of Mabel Mercer and her idiosyncratic phrasing and style of singing. Here is her beautiful interpretation of Cole Porter's song, After You. 

I opened the windows and let the fresh sea air in to sweep away the stagnant, idle moments. After breakfast, I arranged both fresh and dried flowers. I like the flowers in the hallway, the staircase and everywhere around the house. The flowers add life. As a hay-fever sufferer, during the height of spring and summer months, I have to console myself with dried flowers since the pollens from the fresh flowers can exacerbate my pollen allergy.

  

After arranging flowers and drinking a cup of tea, I walked towards the village’s pond in the raw, bitterly cold north-easterly wind. I followed the woodland creatures, my path-finding friends; rabbits, squirrels, black birds and red robins to guide me into the woods. This morning the whole surrounding was covered with morning dew and hoar frost like sparkling dusts from diamonds. I thought all the magical fairies must be perfectly at home here when they came out at night in the shimmering forest.  

After a long harsh winter, spring comes slowly to the village. Daffodils are the first to come out with their small, demure faces turning towards the sunlight. All the young leaves and buds are soft, pale and limp after their arduous effort of hatching. They gradually turn the whole landscape into a hazy lime green colour until it starts to glow like the stained glass windows.   

Blue snowdrop flowers in early spring in the forest

The renewal of life was slowly emerging everywhere with green tender leaves unfurling towards the brightening eastern sky after a long dark winter. The white frost on the emerald green lichens, like lace embroidery, clinging onto the tree trunks and branches. The pond was still frozen with a glassy reflection of the sky and the bare branches from the trees.

The emerald green lichens embroidered on the tree trunks ....

The village's pond is frozen with the glassy reflection of the sky and the trees

There was no other sound than of my subdued footsteps, followed by the birdsongs disturbing the usual tranquillity of early spring’s morning.  A heron was waiting patiently for a fish at the edge of the pond near the brown reeds. The bird is incredibly graceful with its fragile body. When it stands on one leg, it resembles the shape of the shepherd's crook.  

Heron fishing in the pond...The nautical motif, provided by nature, is in full force here...The woodland is not a place to pass by but it is a place to pause and observe its magic. It provides a garden sanctuary for both man and beast. 

The woodsmoke, half-treading, half-afloat and half-still, from the chimney’s flame filled the air. The transparent world suddenly became opaque after the lingering smoke evaporated into the grey mist and salty sea spray.  I quietly approached the frozen pond to survey its depth. The heron bewildered by the human’s presence took its instinctual flight to the north.

The other side of the pond, on the south facing hillside, was covered with the snowdrops under a smoky light, twinkling with morning dews like stars. It reminds me of Thoreau’s line when he talked about loneliness: “Why should I feel lonely? Is not our planet in the Milky Way?”         

Snowdrops glistening with dewdrops like a constellation of stars

In keeping with the home's nautical theme, I chose seabirds and waterfowl (including ducks, geese and curlews - sadly no herons) inspired quilt on the sofa. 

My current reading includes mostly light romantic fiction by D. E. Stevenson (1892-1973), the Scottish writer. Her books possess quaintness and charm but they do not press the nerve or leave you drained like intellectually heavier fare. Nevertheless, they are, to use Churchill's words when he described his love of painting, like "a friend who makes no undue demands". Her stories evoke humour, romance and passion, and a nostalgia for simpler times.  

Although D. E. Stevenson was famous in her lifetime, her books are now very hard to come by...even in her native country, Scotland. A few of her bestseller novels have been re-printed in paperback editions. But I don't think that there is enough demand to publish her books in a more high quality hardcover edition. 

It is almost impossible not to succumb to Stevenson's spell. The literary blood runs in her family. Her father is a first cousin of Robert Louis Stevenson. Her portrayal of character Mrs. Tim Christie, the wife of an Army officer during the early days of Second World War when Britain faces its darkest hour, is touchingly quaint, effortlessly witty, and refreshingly heart-warming. It is written in the style of diary entries and based on Stevenson's real life. The arduous simplicities of her family's life and their small adventures are described in detail. Stevenson's avid fans will find the tale disarming; discerning readers may wonder whether life and love are so nearly as cloudless as Mrs. Tim depicts to be. However, it is the epitome of the era, a classic among the wartime wave of 'escape' (I prefer the word 'consolatory') novels. After all, Samuel Johnson was right when he once said: "The only end of writing is to enable readers better to enjoy life or better to endure it."      

I shall always make time for thoughtful and quixotic views of the world (mostly comedies of manners and the timeless foiles and fancies of human beings) by Mrs. Robert Henrey

The Wine of Solitude by Irène Némirovsky (1903-1942). She is one of the most poignant stylists, a class of her own. Her writing is beyond criticism and startlingly beautiful. It is a memory steeped in sadness. For her, it was a means of trying to come to terms with the loss of homeland, family and culture. Her novels leave the reader with a mesmerising portrait of a now vanished world. Above all, I think it is her embrace of all humanity, stoicism and self-deprecation during the Nazi invasion of France in 1940 that made her one of the very best writers. I will be writing more about her books in the future post.  

Flopsy is getting the spring fever as the Easter Sunday approaches. She simply wishes to go out of door and chew fresh lettuces and dandelions on the grass in the sunshine. She is half rabbit and half bear, handmade by a very talented Dutch artist, Marijke van Ooijen.

This is Flopsy's best friend, Purple who loves gardening.

The details of Flopsy's body and laced trimmed pink shoes are extraordinary.

German lieder had a somewhat soporific effect on Philomena.

Happy Easter!