‘bikepack’
my heart is all soft again • some images that chipped away at the hard city concrete exterior • a water rat, swimming across the river like a little otter. a boxer dog, ecstatic to be out chasing a ball thrown by his boss at st margarets bay. pheasants surprised from their resting places, whirring away with their colourful plumage on display. mushroom circles daring fairies to come and dance at the battle of britain memorial. gusts of wind rippling the surface of the lakes near lydd. flocks of jackdaws circling the castle towers in rye at sunset. the sun coming out at deal, sparkling on the grey blue water and lighting up the pastel buildings and fishermen on the wharf. • ripples on the water making ripples in my heart making me soft and malleable like the water i swim in, powerful and bracing. embraced by the afternoon sun, arms held wide coasting down a hill, singing snippets of songs. legs pumping as always, pushing myself up the hills, heart in throat, it’s ready to come out of my mouth like butterflies expelled from my lungs, reaching out into the landscape and finding a resting place there. • there are moments when it doesn’t matter where you are, only that you are there, and that you have softened and melted into the landscape which here, has flint in its bones. soft like chalk, hard like flint, terry pratchett’s tiffany aching and arthur ransome’s titty walker both teaching me about myself over and over through books and countryside, as i dream over hill and down dale. • time to try to be soft in the big hard city until i need to go on another adventure to clear my head and heart once more.
