Yesterday evening I went to my local park and was struck by changes in the trees. I seemed to have walked into a premature autumn. Trees were shedding leaves. To me, the trees in the picture above appeared distressed. Looking at them again now, I wonder about disease as well as simple unseasonal shedding.
In the park, I found beauty too, with new colours becoming manifest. In my part of the world, the latter part of August has always included intimations of Autumn. But 2025 feels unusually dramatic and unusually early. Some trees, like the horse chestnut below, seem to be shedding their leaves particularly fast.
Other trees seemed to be weathering this period more easily, like these medlars now bearing their fruit – bringing autumn into August in an apparently unstressed way.
Standing back, I could see new patterns in the no longer quite so green Greenwood. They illustrate new conditions and are, for better or worse, harbingers of a new time. There will be more changes. I hope that the trees will continue to adapt and stay in place for many years to come. But nothing is certain, in this time of climate crisis and the rise of willed ignorance about its severity.
The sunsets continue to get earlier. I walked into one as I left the park. The sun asserted it’s power in a late stage of its descent. It’s been a hot summer as well as a dry one. I took this powerful, almost too powerful, late summer solar image with me as I walked back to my home.
Where I live, late summer is often the warmest time of year, and the driest. This is likely to be the case in 2025, already a warm dry year. But in the sun’s apparent annual journey, it is also a time of waning. Sunrise is an hour later than at the solstice, and sunset is forty-five minutes earlier. This change will accelerate from now on.
I do not see waning as negative. There is power and beauty in this ‘waning’. In the rowan (aka mountain ash) picture above, the berries are moving from tentative orange to bright scarlet, an effect of the seasonal changes in the light. Rowan is an ogham tree, linking a group of indigenous Irish and British trees to an ancient Irish alphabet. Its Gaelic name luis means bright or flame.
Looking at the year as a whole, some of the berries will still be holding on beyond midwinter, by which time the tree, which can live for up to 200 years, will be making its annual comeback. At that time, as described in William Anderson’s justly venerated in Green Man poem (1):
The hungry birds harry the last berries of rowan
But white is her bark in the darkness of rain
‘I rise with the sap’, says the Green Man
‘I rise with the sap’ says he. (1)
The resilience of the tree runs throughout its year and lifetime. In late summer specifially, this resilience is manifested in berries at their brightest, against the backdrop of a still blue evening sky.
Traditionally Rowan has strong associations with protection, spiritual protection not least. According to The Green Man Tree Oracle (2), ‘it can also offer insight into danger through the invocation of higher wisdom’. Ancient Druid shamans were said to breathe in the smoke from rowan fires to initiate a trance state that allowed them to predict coming danger.
The Druids also planted rowan, as well as oak and ash, in their sacred groves. But Celtic Druids were not the only people to place a high value on the rowan tree. Our modern word rowan is probably descended from the Norse runas – narrowly translated as ‘charm’ but in fact bringing the wider runic and Norse traditions with it.
When I encountered the rowan I was strongly moved by it. It stood out from everything else. I had previously decided not to take pictures on my walk, but felt compelled to change my mind. I didn’t need ancient lore to feel more alert and heartened. It’s just that the framing it provides added cultural depth. The encounter with rowan put a spring in my step and was a highlight of my evening.
(1) William Anderson Green Man: archetype of our oneness with the Earth Harper Collins: London & San Francisco, 1990
(2) John Matthews & Will Worthington The Green Man Tree Oracle: ancient wisdom from the greenwood London: Connections, 2003
Noticing a single corn stalk under our neighbouring birch trees, I wonder whether the seed simply blew in or was planted by an unknown hand. If the latter, what was their intention? I realise that I will never know.
I do know how much I enjoy its presence in this space at this time. I experience it as a miracle inviting gratitude and it has marked the seasonal moment for me, this first harvest of a now declining year.
With increasing clarity I understand that I do not work well with personified and individualised images of the divine. Something seems subtly off, as if I am failing to sound my own authentic note in the Great Song of the world.
I believe that we are given different gifts in our encounters with the Cosmos, leading to legitimately different understandings. When I lean in to the notion of divine personality – even when using the term ‘Spirit’ in that sense – I am not fully living my own truth. I subtly disempower myself and weaken my connection.
For in my universe, when I rest in my own clarity, there is no separation between nature (including culture) and spirit. In the awkward activity of identification and labelling, I answer to terms like animist, panentheist and nondualist.
These words are approximations, with the power to be distracting and slightly depressing. I can find words that point to my experience well enough. But the explanatory words, the more formal and generalised terms, feel clumsy. There’s a necessary level of unknowing that these isms don’t recognise.
When consciously living in spirit, I am neither alone, as a single human person, nor am I with another being. I am simply in a different dimension of embodied awareness, supported and empowered by the bubbling source from which I spring. For me, Nature is more than the ‘nature’ of dualist spiritualities and of the scientific humanism that grew out of them.
As I harvest the learning, or relearning, of this lesson, I renew my commitment to practice and path, once again revising the beginning and end of the modern Druid’s prayer (1). I move from from ‘Grant, Spirit your protection, and in protection, strength … ‘ to ‘In spirit I find protection, and in protection, strength …’. I end with ‘and in the love of all existences, the love of this radiant Cosmos’ rather than ‘the love of God/Goddess/Spirit and all goodness’. These small changes formalise and anchor my understanding. For me, they are an important affirmation, illuminating my path.
(1) Traditionally, this prayer runs:
Grant O God/Goddess/Spirit, your protection,
And in protection, strength,
And in strength, understanding,
And in understanding, knowledge,
And in knowledge, the knowledge of justice
And in the knowledge of justice, the love of it
And in the love of it, the love of all existences
And in the love of all existences, the love of God/Goddess/Spirit and all goodness”.
NB Providing the options of God/Goddess/Spirit is I think an OBOD (Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids) innovation. The original version, from the late 18th century, simply said ‘God’. Some modern Druids say ‘God and Goddess’.
Richard’s Wood, Alney Island, was planted in 1983. It commemorates the 500th anniversary of the Charter given to the people of Gloucester by King Richard III. He was their Duke before he became King. People here have never quite seen him as the stage villain portrayed by William Shakespeare. Or, if so, as only one Royal stage villain among others.
Three years ago I wrote an Alney Island post where I ended by criticising how Richard’s Wood has been developed and managed (1). I don’t think I was wrong, but this time I felt very different, less willing to judge.
It was a hot day. I wanted to be outside. Being under cover in a wood not hard to negotiate was ideal. I strolled into enchantment. I surrendered to the trees and the way in which, together, they covered and held me.
In this state of attention, I don’t think much about botanical facts or lore. I respond to shape, texture, smell, subtle sounds, colour, light, light, shade and wonder at Nature’s variety.
I spent longer in the wood than I expected. I relished every moment I was there. I am now a friend of this space and expect to visit more often.
8pm, 25 July. Alchemy on the canal. The evening sun, low and potent in the sky, strikes the flowing water. At points the union of the two creates a molten liquid light, clearly defined in the still image above.
By contrast, the short video below reveals light and water together in movement. Flow, and patterns in the flow, draw my attention. They show me an energised harmony, becoming more than the sum of their parts.
I notice also that when I play the video without sound, I find it contemplative and reflective. When I play it with sound, the birds immerse me in living nature. I value both experiences.
I usually feel a transition into late summer about now, a little before Lammas/Lughnasadh. The days here are still long, though now clearly not as long as they have been. It’s a warm time, often the warmest of the year. Blackberries have appeared on their bushes, a foretaste of autumnal fruit bearing.
I am reminded, too, of the Fferyllt, the Druid alchemist in OBOD tradition. She is a woman of power and a devotee of Brigid. In the Druidcraft Tarot (1) she is represented by Trump XIV, standing for fluency between worlds, creativity, harmony, peace, alchemy and magic. My canal side encounter with fire on water nudged my imagination towards this figure, who somehow completed it.
(1) Philip and Stephanie Carr-Gomm The DruidCraft Tarot: Use the Magic of Wicca and Druidry to Guide Your Life London: Connections, 2004. Illustrated by Will Worthington.
Above, through the trees, we can see one of the chapels belonging to the Arnos Vale Cemetery in Bristol, England. It was built as a garden cemetery extending over 45 acres in 1839, as the city’s old parish graveyards were becoming overcrowded and a health hazard. The new venture was designed to be spacious, with sunlight, fresh air, trees and shrubs.
It worked well for nearly 150 years. But in 1987 the owners announced their intention to clear a large section for ‘development’. An Association for the Preservation of Arnos Vale Cemetery swiftly sprang up. It fought successfully for a safe future for the site, gaining the support of the Bristol City Council, Bristol citizens and many people worldwide.
Now, as the Friends of Arnos vale, they continue to manage what they describe as “a hillside Victorian cemetery and conservation park, with heritage and wild life tours, plus a café”. It takes a lot of effort and activity to keep this precious space going, yet on my occasional visits I still find it tranquil and unspoilt.
For me it is a magical place, largely because the graves are being allowed to sink back into the land. There is something primal about the cross above, rough hewn, almost equal armed, and decorated with foliage. Still a cemetery, Arnos Vale has become something wilder than a garden. At this time of year, the paths become green tunnels, deftly concealing their destinations.
Yesterday I walked in Arnos Vale with a friend, and our direction of travel required a descent towards the main buildings. The steps we went down were not as overgrown as the ones below, but l found them challenging enough. The imagery and effortful activity of descent give me the feeling of a deep earth and underworld journey, and the sense of enchantment that goes with it.
Towards the bottom of the slope, my recognition of a re-enchanted space in a largely disenchanted world is further strengthened. A cross again. Evergreen ivy growing up it. Vivid summer blooms behind and in front. Tall wild grass. Trees in the background. Green abundance enhancing the gravestone rather than diminishing it. Life and death companioning each other without drama or fuss. Contemplating this natural harmony, I feel heartened and refreshed.
I see change in a familiar scene. Looking out from our apartment I contemplate a gentle twilight. It is modified by artificial light. During the recent heatwave I somehow had little consciousness of this moment in the day. But now, with lower temperatures and rain, my world is a tiny bit different. I discover myself in a twilit scene, and a twilight frame of mind, a little after sunset.
Although this sunset is only ten minutes earlier than the sunsets of the Solstice period, I feel, deep within me, the turning of the Wheel. It’s as if I am leaning in to the spirit of late summer, and the first of the harvest festivals that define the waning year. We are not there yet, though Lammas is but a fortnight away. I am simply becoming aware of a coming seasonal shift.
I am also aware of wanting to savour the sense of a change without wanting to hurry it on. Above, an image of trees, houses, hills and sky anchors me into a specific place and time. It’s a ‘now’ experience rather than an anticipation. Below, an image of birch leaves back-lit by electric light holds me in an appreciation of the pattern they make. I am held by the power of a simple pleasure.
It is a little after 7 pm, and the mellowing evening of a hot day. The sky is clear. On 12 July, there are still nearly two and a half hours before sunset. It is about 31C/87.8F with a light breeze. Elaine and I feel comfortable enough to go for a walk in town.
We start quietly in our own neighbourhood. We are, we think, towards the end of a hot period that peaked at 35C/95F. This counts as serious heat in England. For several days, we have been staying indoors for much of the day. There have been quick forays in the mornings, mostly to an air conditioned shopping centre nearby.
We needed to get out at the first opportunity. We are rewarded, in this evening, by a freshness grown unfamiliar, and by powerful contrasts of light and shade as seen in the priory ruins below.
To leave our Greyfriars estate, we walk down a narrow lane that separates a pub from a church. We enter Southgate Street in the old town through an archway. Entering the street, we are conscious again of vivid blue sky, and the mix of sunlight and shadow. The street is hardly crowded, but it is certainly peopled on this warm summer evening.
At this stage we are not sure of our destination. We just want to be free and mobile and outdoors. We decide to turn right. Soon we will be reaching the cross roads at the centre of the old town. If we turn left, we will find ourselves in Westgate Street*, with the Cathedral Close (College Green) as our likely destination.
Gloucester Cathedral, and in particular College Green, are a friendly space for us. It is still the dominant set of buildings in the town centre, just a little set apart from the shopping streets. Often a busy place, it is also a contemplative one. As we sit there enjoying the opportunity to be out, we notice that the temperature is cooling as we move towards 8 pm.
Eventually we decide to return home, leaving College Green through another alley, this one a location for shops and restaurants. It’s been a nurturing time in the high summer city.
When Gloucester was first established by the Romans in 97 AD as Colonia Glevum, it was built as a walled city with gates in each of the four cardinal directions. Hence the streets Eastgate, Southgate, Westgate and Northgate. I believe that Aethelflaed, Lady of Mercia, brought the street names back into use in their English form whilst based in Gloucester round about 900 AD.
An Interview with Frank McEowen (1) is the latest offering in Philip Carr-Gomm’s This Magical Life podcast. The overall aim of This Magical Life is to explore the intersection of Druidry, Psychology and Wisdom. Philip is a clinical psychologist and led OBOD (the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids) for some 30 years. Frank is the author of, among other works, The Mist-Filled Path: Celtic Wisdom for Exiles, Wanderers and Seekers.
This wide-ranging interview covers three main topics: Celtic bards, Chinese hermit poets and politics in America today. All of these are tied into Frank’s journey and service. He was born in Mississippi, USA, of Irish, Scottish, Welsh and English ancestry. At an early age he experienced mystical encounters with the other world. These later prompted him to work with indigenous elders in North America, and later with teachers in Britain and Ireland, especially Ireland, opening himself also to the spirit(s) of place. He speaks of his journey as a whole as one of ‘soul retrieval’. His early books – The Mist-Filled Path, Meditations on the Irish Sprit Wheel, and The Spiral of Memory and Belonging, come out of this experience.
For reasons explained in the interview, Frank then made a decision to ‘disappear inward’, becoming a hermit and poet. As well as working in Celtic spirituality, Frank was also a student of Zen. He had a natural attraction to Chinese and Japanese wayfaring hermit poetry and modelled the life style as well as the art, adjusted to a different time and culture. This period led to three books of poetry published under the name of Frank LaRue Owen: The School of Soft Attention,The Temple of Warm Harmony and Stirrup of the Sun and Moon.
Like Philip, part of Frank’s service is in the field of psychological healing and personal development, principally as a student of Arnold Mindell. Mindell coined the term ‘Dream Body’ – a psycho-spiritual approach that is also Earth reverencing. It is within this framework that they talk about American politics today. First they identify distressed energies within the national psyche which the current President has uncorked and used in a darkly charismatic and disinhibited way. The discussion takes off from there, looking at issues of grief, loss (of democracy) and possible hope. Connecting this predicament to the bard/poet vocation, Frank quotes Ukrainian poet Ilya Kaminski: “the project of Empire is to dull the senses. The project of the poet is to wake up the senses”. Projects of Empire are not unique to the USA. There is something to reflect on for us all.
I recommend this podcast as a rich and varied conversation, covering a lot of ground in its 36 minutes.
(1) The YouTube post spells Frank’s surname as McEowen and the covers of his early books use MacEowen. I don’t know if he has altered the spelling over time.
Contemplative Inquiry 