December

For Santa Lucia

'Tis the year's midnight, and it is the day's, 

Lucy's, who scarce seven hours herself unmasks; 

The sun is spent, and now his flasks 

Send forth light squibs, no constant rays; 

The world's whole sap is sunk;

A Nocturnal upon St. Lucy's Day

John Donne

St Lucie's day is actually December 13th, although in times past the celebration of this virgin martyr from Siracusa (died 304) coincided with the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year (in the northern hemisphere), which is December 21st.

In 2010 I wrote about this day in another piece, after interring my father's ashes on a snowy day in Hertfordshire (https://www.richardpgibbs.org/2012/12/a-nocturnal-upon-st-lucys-day.html)

And I am reminded every year when we reach this turning point, where hope will rise from the cold cold ground.

It will!

So far, this winter has not been too bad in Norfolk, and I have been walking the blues away, watching nature take its course.  The pink-footed geese flying out of The Wash in the mornings:

And over the village, towards the sugar beet fields as the sun rises

Redshank

And black-tailed godwit

Feeding in the muddy shallows, while a marsh harrier hunts among the reeds:

On farmland a buzzard takes warmth from the low-lying sun:

While frost still coats the fallen leaves:

A hare makes haste to avoid my lens:

And I miss, by a whisker, a shot of a weasel drinking from a rain pool on the track, and then, again too slow, I miss the barn owl that roosts in the barn by Sedgeford Carr.

But overhead under Lodge Hill, the jackdaws are playing chase, clattering in and out of the trees and chacking at each other in the leafless heights:

I note that the fairy houses are locked tight now, their occupants no doubt somewhere warm:

And I spook myself with the reflection of my doppelgänger where the path is water filled:

Time to move.  This time tomorrow I should be on the Danube - flow, river flow - and all this will join the splinters of other memories whirring in my head.  Life's a blur, but there is a crack in everything.....

That's how the light gets in.....

[Thank you Leonard....]

Since she enjoys her long night's festival, 

Let me prepare towards her, and let me call 

This hour her vigil, and her eve, since this 

Both the year's, and the day's deep midnight is.

Or, perhaps,

Sul mare luccica l’astro d’argento.

Placida è l’onda, prospero è il vento.

Sul mare luccica l’astro d’argento.

Placida è l’onda, prospero è il vento.

Venite all’agile barchetta mia,

Santa Lucia! Santa Lucia!

Venite all’agile barchetta mia,

Santa Lucia! Santa Lucia!

Santa Lucia

Traditional Neapolitan 

Guillaume Louis Cottrau (1797 - 1847)