If you, like me, are scouring the outdoors for signs of spring at the moment, I’ve got some thoughts to share around finding beauty in the rain, and turning to poetry for nurturing your heart in difficult times. The latter is something quite special - Dorothy Wordsworth’s journals edited into poetry by my father, in a new book with my own cover design.
Last week I was in North Wales for a few days. Stopping at a favourite small lake in Snowdonia, there was little colour, and intermittent rain. Yet, standing by the lakeshore, watching the raindrops form circles on the lake’s surface, and listening to the rhythmic drumming of a woodpecker, there was tranquility and gratitude to be found. The alders were full of catkins, and the lake’s reflections were muted variants of grey.
Raindrops hanging in the trees at the lakeside.
There’s a particular beauty to be found in wet weather.
Dorothy Wordsworth had a highly refined sensibility. Her nature observations are vivid, photographic in their focus and at the same time Romantic in feeling. My father, Stuart Harris, has undertaken a beautiful project editing her journals into standalone poems - 24 in total. The collection is licensed by Oxford University Press and professionally printed into a beautiful volume that can be treasured and returned to again and again. The cover features my own photograph of a solo birch tree in spring - perfectly complementing Dorothy’s poem on the same subject, found in the volume.
Titled ‘The Visionary Heart of Dorothy Wordsworth’, there are a small number of copies available to purchase on my website.
There is much advice to be found today about quietening ourselves, slowing down, finding activities that help us focus on the here and now; reaching for a book of poetry can work wonders. For me, composing haiku poetry to complement my photography is a way of finding further opportunities for contemplation after the activity of being outside in all weathers capturing nature. Some dedicated poets write a haiku a day - why not have a go yourself?
The British Haiku Society has a range of resources and inspiration to get you started.
As I write I can hear a blackbird singing as dusk arrives, - we have a pair nesting in our hedge. On that ‘note’ I will sign off, and hope to be writing again soon when there has been warmth and sunshine to enjoy.