One of the many advantages of living where I do,  in Lewes, UK, is that I have open country less than a five minutes walk from my front door.

The sunny February weather has been just too beautiful to miss, so yesterday afternoon I went for a walk down my local river, the Ouse and, as you can see, February doesn’t get much prettier than this.

It was the light that drew me out of doors with my camera for a delightfully wicked stolen hour when I could have been working up here in my study.

Having a rural river walkway – try saying that after a few drinks – is an added temptation to anyone who likes playing around with a camera.

The clean February sun lit the rushes and skeletal trees with feature film artistry.

River reflections doubled the landscape.

The river banks came to life with Nature’s equivalent of studio lighting.

Canada Geese ploughed watery sky blue furrows as they paddled undisturbed.

It was worth crossing East Sussex’ s legendary mud if you could avoid it sucking off your boots. I wonder if this is why the river is called the Ouse.

Back at home, there was a bit of cleaning up to do.

The post Ousing with February charm and mud – the River Ouse at Lewes. appeared first on Wolfie Wolfgang.

One hundred years ago today, 24th June, 1914, a train stopped for a few minutes at a small country station in the Gloucestershire village of Adlestrop. Sitting in one of the carriages was the poet Edward Thomas (1878 – 1917). The window was open and the sounds of an English summer’s day played uninterrupted for a few moments before the train moved on.

 Edward Thomas marked the moment with a poem, Adlestrop, and it has come to stand as a poignant and, maybe, unintended encapsulation of the England that would never be quite the same again only a couple  months later.

The very name Adlestrop conjures up the kind of English summer’s day that is often so tranquil and beautiful that it is almost painful. Now, of course, it will always be associated with Edward Thomas’ poem and with the loss of a particular but possibly mis-remembered England, after the beginning of the First World War which would also claim the life, in 1917, of Edward Thomas himself.

Sitting here this morning in my Lewes house, the window is open, the sun is shining and, yes, a blackbird is singing. I couldn’t help but think of this poem on its centenary. Maybe all was not lost in that terrible conflict.

Adlestrop

Yes, I remember Adlestrop —
The name, because one afternoon
Of heat the express-train drew up there
Unwontedly. It was late June.

The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was Adlestrop — only the name

And willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.

And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

Edward Thomas 24/06/1914

Here is beautiful voiced Richard Burton reading Adlestone:

——————————————————————————————————–

STEPHEN DEARSLEY’S SUMMER OF LOVE BY COLIN BELL

My novel, Stephen Dearsley’s Summer Of Love, was published  on 31 October 2013. It is the story of a young fogey living in Brighton in 1967 who has a lot to learn when the flowering hippie counter culture changes him and the world around him.

It is now available as a paperback or on Kindle (go to your region’s Amazon site for Kindle orders)

You can order the book from the publishers, Ward Wood Publishing:

http://wardwoodpublishing.co.uk/titles-fiction-colin-bell-stephen-dearsleys-summer-of-love.htm 

…or from Book Depository:

http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/Stephen-Dearsleys-Summer-Love-Colin-Bell/9781908742070

…or from Amazon:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Stephen%20Dearsley’s%20Summer%20Of%20love

feature=mhee

COLIN BELL’S PUBLICATIONS:

Stephen Dearsley’s Summer Of Love
Ward Wood Publishing
October 30, 2013

http://www.wardwoodpublishing.co.uk/titles-fiction-colin-bell-stephen-dearsleys-summer-of-love.htm

Genius Floored: Uncurtained Window
Soaring Penguin Press
June 15, 2013
Poetry anthology


http://www.soaringpenguinpress.com/publications/poetry/genius-floored-whispers-in-smoke/

Genius Floored: Whispers in Smoke
Soaring Penguin Press
June 6, 2014
Poetry anthology

http://www.soaringpenguinpress.com/publications/poetry/genius-floored-whispers-in-smoke/

Reaching Out
Cinnamon Press
December 2012
Poetry and short story anthology

http://www.cinnamonpress.com/product-item/reaching-out/

Tic Toc
A Kind Of A Hurricane Press
June 2014
Poetry anthology

http://www.kindofahurricanepress.com/2014/06/tic-toc-is-now-available.html

The Blotter
The Blotter Magazine Inc.
November 2009
Three pages of poetry in the American South’s unique, free, international literature and arts magazine.

http://www.blotterrag.com/back-issues/2009-11.pdf

The Fib Review
Musepie Press
My Fibonacci poetry has appeared in this journal from 2009 until the present

http://www.musepiepress.com/fibreview/writers.html

Shot Glass Journal
Muse Pie Press
My poetry has appeared in various issues of this short form poetry journal

http://www.musepiepress.com/shotglass/writers.html

Every Day Poets Magazine
Every Day Poets
I have various poems of the day published in this 365 days a year poetry magazine.

http://www.everydaypoets.com/?s=Colin+Bell

In The Night Count The Stars
Bittersweet Editions
March 1, 2014
An “uncommon anthology” of images, fragments, stories and poetry.

http://www.bittersweeteditions.com/in-the-night-count-the-stars.html#%2EU8ZFXY1dXoo

The post Edward Thomas’ Adlestrop one hundred years on: rural England before the First World War. appeared first on Wolfie Wolfgang.

I took this picture of my Bramley’s Seedling apple tree just before I went off on holiday a few weeks ago feeling hopeful that my first attempt at growing an espalier fruit tree would succeed as, in its second year in my garden, it was showing serious signs of producing a proper crop of cooking apples. Espalier trees, in case you don’t know, are pruned so that they send their branches out sideways restricting their height and they are thus ideal for my small town garden in Lewes in Southern England and ideal too, for someone who is mildly obsessive about pruning.

When I got back home from the remarkably hotter climates of Sicily and America, I was a bit depressed by the boringly dull and gloomy English July and began to wonder why I bothered staying here. Temperate climates never quite reach the glamourously hot temperatures of our holiday destinations and I felt more than a little bored huddled up in my study looking out at clouds and rain. It was the sight of my Bramley’s Seedling tree that cheered me up. The fruit had grown considerably and was beginning to show that delightfully shy blush on its cheek that marks the beginning of its slow ripening process. The apples will not be fully ripe until sometime in October, or even November after mellowing in England’s hopefully gentle August sun and golden and very temperate Autumn. It was this thought that reconciled me to this country’s highly variable climate.

There is a good chance, if you don’t live in the UK, that you will be unfamiliar with this very English phenomenon, the big, bitter tasting cooking apple that, when cooked, goes all fluffy and makes the most perfect of apple pies. Apparently it is hardly grown anywhere else  – some in Canada, I am told and maybe in some parts of the USA. The English climate is ideal for them here even if it is not always ideal for this sun-loving but fair-skinned Englishman.

The first Bramley’s Seedling tree grew from pips planted early in the 19th Century by someone called Mary Ann Brailsford who, far from being a horticulturist, was just a young child playing in her garden in the village of Southwell in Nottinghamshire. That was in 1809.The tree thrived in that garden and when the cottage was bought by a local butcher, Matthew Bramley in 1846, Mary Ann Brailsford disappeared from view leaving Mr Bramley to have his name immortalised. In 1856, a local nurseryman, Henry Merryweather asked if he could take cuttings from the tree seeing the quality of its apples. Bramley agreed but only if the apples should bear his name. Poor Mary Ann Brailsford, it is too late now to call Bramleys, Brailsfords.

I have been watching mine with growing enthusiasm from the time they were mere fruitlets…I hope Mary Ann got as much pleasure form her’s.

The post Bramley’s Seedling cooking apples are an English phenomenon – their apple pies make living in England worthwhile. appeared first on Wolfie Wolfgang.

Lewes is an eccentric, liberal and unorthodox place – home to folk traditions, street processions and the largest Bonfire celebration in the World. It is home too – I am a lucky person.

The post Lewes – My Home Town appeared first on Wolfie Wolfgang.