A new video by Bodi Hallett
Hartshead
In Hartshead I’m walking paths I’ve walked for years, following the line of trees through wind, rain and dark clouds moving fast from the moors. I’ve learned to know since young the faint path through the fields that takes you to the woods, above the valley, leads you through hedgerows spiked with haws. And still between those trees I see Huddersfield cramped in the Colne, Castle Hill, the westering line of Saddleworth Moor smouldering above. Winter’s bleak but still there’s the green armchair of the valley sheltered by wood and the pale green fields worked from the farm. In snow, there’s a sharp edge to the eye’s inventory of stonewall and hedgerow, a white silence stretched to breaking on the still days the wind begs off from the west. Spring’s an apple green, bladed with new grass and blackened with cows turned out from the barns. The hawthorn’s white surprise still shocks the eye’s forgetful winter rest. Summer’s a still image. Shimmering heat and the streaked blur of a rabbit out from the gorse on Hartshead lane. The road a parched wander to liquid, waist-high green-gold barley foresting the path to the Grey Ox Inn. Now Autumn’s the damped fire of fallen leaves raked over by wind, the earthly crackle of bracken underfoot, the giver of vision, the light defined by dark, the firm upward needle of Clifton spire flared by a single ray from the clouds. -from River Flow: New & Selected Poetry
Ah, writing now from Arranmore Island off the coast of Ireland, so very good to find your "Hartshead" here and to have your video (thank you). I have always relished images in my mind from your descriptions of Yorkshire, and now to see it and read again your poem, is such fine nourishment. Blessings and gratitude to you and all those working with you. I return to the US mid month. I love September! There's NO light like the light of early autumn showing us such tender light.
David, and Bhodi, thank you both so much for this...
As I sit here on a Sunday afternoon in Richmond in the states, I am easily reminded of the space that resonated similarly with me. Alas, it is no more as the development machine has churned through.
This piece though has driven be to find another, and I have. It is in the Blue Ridge Mountains, and I know it will inspire me to make next work.
All the Best,
Bob