online: 28 septemeber 2006
modified: 27, 28 september 2006

26/28 september 2006 from city to forest


26 september 18:21 ...seat above wooded valley...

...this evening i am seeing the forest before me not as flat scenery but in three dimensions... each line of trees appears further away than the one in front of it ... is this because i'm seeing birds fly in the spaces between these layers of vegetation?... sometimes i notice such enhanced perceptions as this when i am inspired - but today i don't think i am...



next day 14:47
Vale of Health... after a tiring trip by underground train to the city, and back, i suddenly left the train at Hampstead to walk the last few kilometres... and to recover what i call 'bodymind' - or accord between outer rhythms and inner...

...the pond and birch trees and gorse and grass and footpath before me - and the flow of thought and action of eyes and hand as i write... and yes these connective presences and actions do succeed, as always, in bringing unity and calm to what so recently was discord and unease...

...a bird is chirping... chp-chp-chp-chp... chp-chp-chp-chp... (and occasionally longer bursts of high-pitched sound)... and now it's ceased and i decide to move on...

...walking past the highest point i pause to look at the distant city towers beneath which (an hour ago) i was feeling so stressed... and disliking what i saw... and now i am quite unable to relate that interior view of the city to this other, from without and far away... two worlds... disconnection...

...but as i stood on a traffic island, waiting to cross, the driver of a van saluted me and smiled!... was he responding to my nautical cap...or was it my demeanour - much improved by returning from the city to the heath...



28 september 2006
...editing this took several attempts... unusual effort... is it that i wrote it while not at ease?... yes i think so...


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