Hadlock Brook Falls

This darksome burn, horseback brown,
His rollrock highroad roaring down,
In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam
Flutes and low to the lake falls home.

A windpuff-bonnet of fáawn-fróth
Turns and twindles over the broth
Of a pool so pitchblack, féll-frówning,
It rounds and rounds Despair to drowning.

Degged with dew, dappled with dew,
Are the groins of the braes that the brook treads through,
Wiry heathpacks, flitches of fern,
And the beadbonny ash that sits over the burn.

What would the world be, once bereft
Of wet and of wildness? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wildness and wet;
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.


Inversnaid, by Gerard Manley Hopkins


I've had this poem on my shortlist ever since I came across it in pixelpixie's journal. Today I decided to let it inspire my choice of excursion, and headed over to Hadlock Pond to walk around and take some photos. I've spent part of the weekend getting way into some new editing techniques, which I have indulged here. It's getting hard to take a photo and just leave it.

In the evening, I was standing at the kitchen counter making my lunch for tomorrow, when I lifted my head and looked straight into the eyes of a bobcat staring back at me. This is the first bobcat I've ever gotten more than a glimpse of in the wild, and it sent a little shiver up my spine. I really, really like living in this house. I've had so many experiences where I have been looking out the window just as some form of wildlife steps, flies, or slithers into view. It feels like a gift every time.