As I sit here in this little clearing I notice a squirrel, head downwards, on a tree trunk. It is emitting a repetitive sound a bit like that of a chicken - and at each sound a convulsive wave travels from its head to its tail. I've never heard and seen a squirrel do this - in a human it might be a sign of illness, or of some extremity.

Today I feel tired and I'm sitting here to rest. The treetops sway in the wind but at ground level the air is almost still. How I like stillness. The nettles vibrate only a few millimetres as the air moves slightly - except now and then when a gust of wind reaches the ground and they move a centimetre or two. The plants and trees look as if they have lost their strength and will become bare in the next strong wind or storm. But this evening they compose a frail and beautiful sculpture of yellowing leaves and half blown-away seeds all retaining the upward light-seeking forms into which they were shaped by sunlight and by the anti-gravitic forces of natural growth and movement (that Walter Carrington so often mentions during his lessons in the Alexander Technique for directing one's life and actions).

The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees
Is my destroyer.

Dylan Thomas (in these his famous lines) includes the idea of negative force which Carrington and Alexander perhaps wisely don't admit to. But nevertheless I prefer Dylan's two-sidedness, his more inclusive image even though I've put it two colours. It's their unity that tells.

And now, revived by composing these thoughts, I feel like getting up and walking back. I feel more wakeful.