Shopping Trip and News

A little sketch.

I have now, hopefully, re-labelled all my poems on this blog to appear under the 'Poem' tag. Further housekeeping will occur over the next week or so and some old posts may disappear. I may also consolidate some things into a separate web page.

A new story series will be posted imminently!

Mr Long Nose

Approaching the cafe: a tall, slow amble.

Door opens and enters.

Looks around.

The bin looks tempting.

A quick rummage,

Nothing of interest there.

Some loose change found in pocket

A cup of tea ordered.

Sits, gazing out the window.

Worn, dusty, mud splashed,

Old leather coat and woollen hat and gloves.

New Jeans.

Long, thin nose

Wild beard,

Very very wild.

Pushes up from the chair

Not too sprightly.

Leaves.

Table disinfected.

Wistman's Wood

Went for a walk to Wistman's Wood on Dartmoor on New Year's Eve. This sketch was made a few days after I arrived back but doesn't really capture the twisted and weather beaten character of the trees in one of the countries highest oak woodlands. It was just a quick sketch one lunchtime to go with the following poem.

Post Christmas thunder and heavy rain clouds

Tightly wrapped coats amidst chilled wind

Well trodden path along granite hillside

Sheep: colour washed with blue.

Walkers passed with damp muddy dogs

Across boggy boulder strewn moorland

The distant wood dwarfed by higher conifers

Anticipation of discovery drives me onward.

Centuries old trees, battered and bruised

One of Britains highest oak woods lies

On a bleak clitter strewn hillside

Where no man nor beast would roam.

Stunted and twisted the trees arise

From between close-knit weathered boulders

Mosses, ferns and lichens

Embedded on rain soaked branches.

History has left this wood untouched

But for curious wanderers, witches and druids

The makers of legends and those

Who seek its artistic inspiration.

A fragile habitat - I shall not enter

To clamber over the rocks and gawp

I have nothing to offer in return and

One less intrusion just might be appreciated.

New for 2018

For the past couple of months I have been on quite a journey of exploration as regards the future of my blog. I have looked and tried a few alternative possibilities to the way I worked but, in the end, decided that it worked too well so there was no point in doing something different. So, now I am back again. This time I have linked the blog to matthewslater.org.uk in order to better utilise the domain name and it has had a few design tweaks.

My aim with the change was to continue to present many of the illustrations that I do as part of my personal sketching, but also to present more writing in the form of poems and short stories.

One of my first ideas was to create a newsletter that I could send out very few weeks. The plan was to start creating snippets of a few stories with a particular theme which I would introduce via the blog. However, my mind then switched into overdrive and decided that these ideas were much better consolidated into a book. So yes, I am now thinking about writing a book. A proper book. One that will take a time to research, accumulate, plan and write. I will share more when I am ready to do so. It looks an exciting project.

So, where am I going? Not too sure! I will use the blog to share some of my thoughts as the year progresses, but I will keep my main ideas under wrap and just provide occasional tantalising dips into the creative process.

Matthew

St Albans Sketch

Photo of the pen and ink illustration in my sketchbook from yesterday. French Row in St Albans.

Drawing in St Albans

Sat outside Simmons Bakers in St Albans yesterday enjoying a cappuccino and drawing French Row.

New Garden Path

A few days ago I spent a merry few hours building a new path through a patch of lawn. This now completes the path all the way up the garden to the summerhouse - a job that I had been planning to do for a long time. Near the house is a patch of patio that is rather dead space perhaps around 8m squared in area. It had originally been covered with paving blocks which, sometime ago, I relocated and then filled the remaining hole with hardcore and topped with woodchip. To make the above path I dug up the larger pieces of hardcore (bricks and old concrete path) crom the patio and reburied it in a trench along the path line. The soil and turf removed will then be replaced back over the patio space to form a new lawn by the house. The path was edged with recycled plastic lawn edging from Homebase and woodchip salvaged from the patio area. I'll put new woodchip on the path when I can get hold of some or buy some. Hopefully it will be last time I see that hardcore and that it now has a permanant home. A pity in some ways as moving it all was an excellent workout! I still have a few lumps of concrete that I didn't have space to bury and so might just move these round the garden every few weeks to keep me fiit.