Heritage
Ropes still hang from the tower but the bells – too dangerous now – have been removed The church is silent: no hymns have been announced, old sermons have soaked into the walls and been plastered over The star and…
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2018
Canada – where the light gets in, and the occasional bear
For my birthday my son gave me a book called The World Needs More Canada. He handed it to me while we were in Canada on holiday, so that I could test the truth of it. On the face of…
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Island Lake
We view the lake from different angles: it is about the size of the universe, and we walk round it By design there are bridges through hyperspace: lily pads, geese and fish swim by: cyclists have to dismount A woman…
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The very model of a G & S enthusiast
I was born in Norwich, but between the ages of five and eleven I lived in Coventry, about as far as you can get from the sea in this country. Not that I was aware of that at the time. I’m…
Passing through
(for David Coomes) One morning early, before what used to be breakfast, you sigh finally, like a breeze, step out of the moral maze and into something quite new, unproduced, unscripted The pain disappears, not gradually but all at once,…
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Farewell to an old friend – David Coomes
It’s not often you find yourself in a congregation that includes top broadcasters Michael Buerk, Michael Portillo and David Starkey – as well as several others who I sort of recognised but couldn’t pin down. The occasion was the funeral…
Encounter at a Rembrandt exhibition
You come back from the future as if it were the normal thing to do, with a cheery wave, breaking up pieces of the past, tangling with my emotions Being a rational kind of guy, like Rembrandt, I can see…
My journey out of grumpiness and into a maximum
Watching Scotland beat England in a one-day cricket international was quite satisfying – partly because I feel a strong affinity to Scotland, despite my recalcitrant DNA, and partly because it wasn’t what I call cricket. The bats are too heavy,…
Something is coming
In the chinese gardens where streams strain dark cold autumn rain, a white-faced bird escapes over slippery stones and I, watching, fall headlong, lie prone on the perfect patterns below the willows Looking up, I see a change in the…
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Great evenings, thanks to Ross and Colin
One day many years ago I had something done to my teeth. I forget what it was (there are so many possibilities), but as usual it involved sitting still for quite a long time, and to distract me from the…