I mourn your passing

In the words of Jim Crumley (The Great Wood)

There are many good reason to plant more trees and to take the time and trouble to do it well. They create the most benevolent of all nature’s habitats. They create opportunities for a greater diversity of wildlife species of all kinds. They create a counterbalance to greenhouse gases. They create stable and long-term rural employment for people…and if rural people are employed they create the circumstances that bond people closer to their place on the map, giving them a stake in the environment of that place. They create opportunities for recreation in a beautiful environment. And they matter for their own sake. And they should matter to us because of the debt we owe.

Elemental

Minerals are links between Earth and human health. The earth's crust contains most of the mineral nutrients our body needs, and the chemical composition of a rock, such as granite, is strikingly similar to the composition of the human body. We rely on geologic processes such as weathering to chemically break down rocks into other natural materials, such as soil, that contain minerals more easily dissolved and are absorbed by roots of plants. When we inhale, the oxygen in the air is bonded to the iron contained in haemoglobin.

Humans share 50% of their DNA with trees

My entry into the off page exhibition of visual poetry that had a successful and busy opening on Thursday 16th March in Glasgow. The piece is a development from previous work around the importance of trees are to humans.

This collection of mini video poems explores this bond with our chlorophyll fuelled woody perennial relatives.

Deeper

Humans share 50% of their DNA with trees - there is an awareness of this connection when we are in a woodland that can give us a sense of wellbeing but also something more than that. It may be a primal link to the importance of trees to our ancestors for shelter, food, warmth and the connection with the seasons, the cosmos and belief systems. Trees are also a repository of information wrapped in years of growth rings that unites us with the past. With that comes both a sense of awe as well as fear of the known and unknown that we can still experience now.

Deeper is the final part of my video piece included in the Off Page exhibition celebrating visual poetry - opening night 16th March 5-8pm at Many Studios 3 Ross Street Glasgow G1 5AR

Prometheus

 My final piece of Americana video poetry once again celebrating the Ancients of the Bristlecone pines but this time in a small stand in Great Basin National Park, eastern Nevada. Wheeler Peak is the highest mountain rising out from the desert in the Snake Range. Prometheus was a living member of a population of Bristlecone pine trees growing near the tree line on the lateral moraine in the corrie of the former glacier below Wheeler Peak. In the 1960's it was felled by a student for research purposes and it has subsequently been assessed as being just under 5,000 years old when it was felled and therefore the oldest known non cloned organism. It was named Prometheus after the mythological figure who stole fire from the gods and gave it to man.In this poem I consider the appropriateness of the name given to the tree as its life was stolen in passing its knowledge onto humans.

Ancients

The Methuselah is the oldest known living tree at 4,854 years. I first heard about the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest from one of the participants of the Landscapes of the Mind Group. These ancient trees inspired his transformational moment and I totally understand why. They are located high in the White Mountains in Inyo County California set against a backdrop of the Sierra Nevada range. They are great twisted caramalised sculptures eking out an existence in this hostile environment, with a growing season of only 45 days a year . Here the science of dendrochronology was founded and still continues to inform us of using the growth rings of the living as well as dead trees ( some are over 12,000 years old) to determine climate change through history as well as help date archaeological sites.

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Tonopah

Made famous to me by a Little Feat song, 'Willin', that takes me back to my teens. Another boom and bust mining town in Nevada which had more success for a few than many others did. The legacy is the Mizpah saloon still on the main route plus the mining park to the rear of the town. At the feet of the old workings are the remnant shacks of the original town and its miners. Now it is more known as a halfway house between the gambling mecca's of Las Vegas and Reno plus of course the nuclear testing range on its doorstep.

Rushed Fever in Death Valley

The astonishing detritus left behind from previous centuries shows the landscape changes endured and still enduring from small to large scale mining activities that led to fevered rushes of thousands coming for the lure of gold and silver. Whilst its activities left terrible scars it also is a reminder of the harsh conditions and loneliness borne by so many

Random Motion

This work was created when in response to travelling in Baxter State Park, Maine, the end of the Appalachian Trail and a truly spectacular fall experience. Butterflies as a metaphor for autumn works well - their colour, beauty and a flight pattern of random motion is reminiscent of falling autumn leaves. They have a short lifespan as do the seasons seem to as I get older.

Two art works exchange aphorisms

A series examining artworks in the environment and their relationship with people and more importantly with each other. What do they talk about when facing each other? Like these two in the grounds the the Scottish Gallery of Modern Art ( Mod Two) :-

Two Two-Way Mirrored Parallelograms Joined with One Side Balanced Spiral Welded Mesh by Dan Graham; and

-There will be no miracles here by Nathan Coley

I imagined them being quite assertive about the importance of themselves and their meaning in the world

A Hidden Land

The second video piece from the Landscapes of the Mind project led by BGS on the broader Landscape Decisions Programme between 2020-22. The aim is to explore how we can bridge creative and evidence-based decision-making about landscape working with a group of scientists ( geologists, oceanographers, hydrologists, archaeologists) and creatives ( poets, artists and dancers). The outputs include both written evidence on Transformational Moments and a public exhibition scheduled October 2022 of the creative aspects of which two of my video pieces created for the project will be shown – Your Beat and A Hidden Land

Without beginning or end

Lines composed at the siting of Richard Long's outdoor sculpture MacDuff's Circle at Mod 2 Edinburgh ( National Museum of Modern Art). I was struck by the triangle that connected 3 very different circles at its location - looking across from the perfect circle ( without beginning or end) of the sculpture connecting with the formal classical monument of James Buchanan in the adjacent Deans Cemetery and then the immediacy of the mature Copper Beech tree on its rounded grass mound.

Your Beat

I was delighted to be part of a creative retreat in July at Jupiter Artland as part of Landscapes of the Mind, one of the projects of the broader Landscape Decisions Programme. The aim was to explore how we can bridge creative and evidence-based decision-making about landscape. I focussed on the symbiotic relationship between humans and trees in this video piece.

Siskin

Beautiful citrus bird with rasping wheeze - so delicate and weightless. I held one and thought it was made of faery stuff

Lost Dreams

The sound of lawn mowers droning and watching weeping willows trailing fingers in sunshine is evocative of long childhood summers. Looking at the watercolours of Sarah Knox, particularly her work of Lost Worlds, Dawyck Botanic Gardens 2021 (https://www.sarahknoxgallery.co.uk/#/lost-worlds/ ) bought back this memory of one of my mothers dreams for our family garden.

Coruisk

Loch Coruisk lies beneath the fortress of the Black Cuillin of Skye - an unnerving and overpowering presence. A shattered, ancient landscape overlain with myths and much weather in which a human is an intruder.

Cyclical

Still on a water theme and the hypnotic effect of the repetitive roll of waves overlaid with a spring cuckoo repeating its refrain reinforcing the endless of cycles of nature.

Taynish Ripples

Mesmerised by the ripples on a pond with spring birdsong - its one of those in the now new fangled mindlefulness moment

New Year Dinner

I am delighted that Poetry Scotland 103 has accepted my poem for publication and in celebration I created video to accompany the poem about a brazen Pine Marten at New Year. The soundtrack is a night flying Little Grebe with a few Tawny Owls for company.

The Rhinns Complex

Everything on Islay seems flighty - from nervous sheep, scattering brown hares, endlessly lifting geese and a very anxious wind blowing from all directions - as if everything has a need for counselling. The only things that seem stable are the rocks where they connect with the earths crust. This geographical area hosts a geological phenomena known as the Rhinns Complex. The only part of Islay that doesn't seem to have a complex.