I have been staying away from my computer, staying away from the social media with their words and images that inspire so much sadness and disgust. Writing fiction is hard too, unnecessary, perhaps even indecent, when real people in real places are suffering, and who will read it anyway?
Winter shrinks like words
once written forgotten
ditches running bright.
The sun is bright between the clouds, the wind brisk but not cold, and the buds are bursting. Daffodils are over but the first forget-me-nots are blinking blue, honeysuckle and plum blossom full of scent and the humming of bees. Alder leaves are opening and elder, the first vine leaves, and the birds are too busy nesting to come to the house after food.
Fox sniffs the air
the storm coming in grey clouds
will break the sky.
The strip of un-grassed clay around the house we call a garden needs weeding and pruning, proliferation dividing, repotting. It keeps my hands busy, my mind on tiny things. It stops me wondering what will happen to these tiny things if, when the unhinged minds blow, the profiteers move in, and the tiny things are ground to dust, indistinguishable from the dust of the great big things.
Spring sparks daffodil
yellow against the blue sky
we still fear nightfall.
Jane Dougherty Writes 
I love all the words you write here. Not much more I can say since I too “fear nightfall.”
It’s what I think about when I wake in the night and what I listen for when I turn on the radio in the morningโwhat more was destroyed in the night?
Your spring is so far ahead of ours! But the nightmares are the same. (K)
I’m pleased I can get out and see real life just getting on with it.
This is so heartfelt and well done, Jane. Your first stanza is haunting!
I feel guilty to be here, on the edge, if not on the fence.
I understand your feelings. It is hard to be on the edge when others are in the middle of it all just trying to survive!
Such a tragedy, and we’re doing nothing except watch.
Very sad! Like a bad movie we can’t turn off!
The world’s full of terrorists itching to go out in a blaze of glory. Can’t one of them do the right thing?
:<(
โค Jane โค
Yes. . .so true. Every day a new horror. . .
The daffodils in the woods are so pretty. Nature goes on where it can despite what we do.
The neighbour keeps everything trimmed, sprayed, clipped, pruned, and has sheep grazing on what isn’t being grown to eat, but he has hundreds of wild daffodils, tulips and cyclamens. We don’t clip or trim anything and the daffodils etc struggle. Doesn’t seem fair ๐
That’s so funny. We are not very good gardeners, but we have lots of daffodils, crocuses, and tulips because it’s easy to plant bulbs. I think the squirrels move them around.
He doesn’t plant them, they’re wild, and he even has the now rare red tulips of Agen. We only have the yellow ones. Maybe his sheep don’t like them.
You could be right about the squirrels, tasting them and throwing them away ๐
Last year we suddenly had all sorts of tulips we had never seen before. ๐
Strange. I know some cultivated flowers revert to wild after a time, but I didn’t know they could go the other way!
Some of our daffodils are “naturalized.” I don’t know about the tulips, but I really think squirrels or other animals dig some of them up and scatter them around.
Wild and cultivated daffodils look exactly the same to me. They’re very ‘rustique’ as we say. Tulips possibly revert too. I wonder what their natural colour is?
I don’t know. We have so many different kinds of daffodils and tulips.
I only know yellow daffodils, but the Dutch have been cultivating different varieties of Tulips for hundreds of years.
We have small yellow daffodils and bigger yellow ones. Then we have some that are very pale yellow.
Yes, the “tulip mania.”
There are narcissi too which look like small daffs to me but are apparently different.
I just looked it up. Daffodils and jonquils are both in the narcissus family, but there are many varieties of each.
I don’t know jonquils. Jonquille is the french for daffodil, must come from that.
I suppose so.
Reblogged this on NEW BLOG HERE >> https:/BOOKS.ESLARN-NET.DE.
We are living in a grazy time. Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Jane! Have a nice Sunday! xx Michael
And you, Michael ๐
I’ve been staying away from the News as well, it’s not good for mental health. When all this started I felt like you and didn’t want to carry on with my WIP, but something made me stick at it and I’m glad I did, as I feel less anxious when I can divert my imagination into fiction. I’m not helping anyone if I’m panicking and thinking negative thoughts.
I keep up to date with what’s going on in Ukraine, but I refuse to read the ugly pro-Putin apologists denying the atrocities, and I can’t stand the idle twittering that goes on about fashion and football as if it’s none of our concern. I dream about it at night, or lie awake wondering about what’s going to happen to all of us. I’d rather be outside walking or gardening. My imaginary world isn’t keeping the war out. I wish it was.
No, I don’t think anything can keep the war out completely at the moment. And being outside definitely helps.
It’s too wild out there today. Not weather to take the mind off it.
honest words and accounts Jane so well put into words. It’s pierces my heart daily. ๐
It’s so close. Every time we hear a military jet go over we wonder if the escalation is starting. We’re at the mercy of a megalomaniac.
Oh Jane, that’s terrifying. Sending you good energy, safety and love. ๐๐
We’re in the flight path of the training flights for a big military camp and at the beginning of the conflict they were roaring overhead all the time, even at night. It’s gone back to normal (very infrequent) levels now. I hope that’s a good sign!
I’m praying Jane that you have some peace through this horrific storm ๐
I’m all right, not in the firing line, just can’t stop thinking about those who are.
ohhhhh i’m the same.. ๐ข๐ข๐ข๐ข๐
xxx