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So, it came fully and in abundance of heat and light: our beloved Sun. All is alight.

...but can you feel a stirring? The ennui is on the cusp of lifting.

2nd April 2018 06.35 The rain on tin stopped drumming, like an army resting on a march. The snow is here in the Hope Valley, falling in silence of itself and wet as waterfall spray. In defiance, the hedge and woodland birds are singing strong and the black crows are even flying up and over from branch to crag. Behind the cascade, and levelled in the rockbed flood-plain - the snow is an overpowering recurring, haunting memory: a flashback; a shadow; a dream; a ghost of what came before. But the blank white skies look empty and flat, but they are full, and natural and multidimensional. But, all I can do is watch and wait, touch and smile.

2nd April 2018 06.35 The rain on tin stopped drumming, like an army resting on a march. The snow is here in the Hope Valley, falling in silence of itself and wet as waterfall spray. In defiance, the hedge and woodland birds are singing strong and the black crows are even flying up and over from branch to crag. Behind the cascade, and levelled in the rockbed flood-plain - the snow is an overpowering recurring, haunting memory: a flashback; a shadow; a dream; a ghost of what came before. But the blank white skies look empty and flat, but they are full, and natural and multidimensional. But, all I can do is watch and wait, touch and smile.

Waiting for the last snow is as restlessly intense as the bleak yearning for the first sun-warmth of Spring. The undeniable dissonance between the two cancelling one another out, like love and betrayal. It is like waiting for the one who got away to come knocking once again at the door of realisation, bringing Nature’s embrace to break the curse of lonesome sunlit mornings and evenings, and to bring the kiss that breaks the curse of waking alone in the first snow.

Higgar Tor (and it’s leaning block, aka “The Rasp” rock route by Joe Brown E2 5b 1956). Spring Equinox 2018.

Below Bamford Edge. Spring Equinox. 20th March 2018.

Spring Equinox. Some roads still “adrift”.

A flare-melt morning - a thawing of nature’s skin by a day opened up and wide in a lit-sudden-warmth, and reflected glare of eye-bright snow. The glinting crags and speckled hills scraggy with stubble and angular chins: in an afternoon of caramelised face-burn glow and alpine chilblain peach rose. The sun sank low then spread a pastel washed evening of bruised blush skies before nightfall, while the birds began lullabying longer into the half-light of their frosted roost time amidst the skeletal trees standing columnular but still falling into the creeping, deepening shadows.

A sensuous feather bed of deep white fallen snow here in the Hope Valley tonight, with icicle bedposts and spun-drift-dunes of compressed powder. A welcome candle-lit refuge at the hidden away Shack after a day wandering on the hill. There’s a chap in the far field who has insisted on staying under canvas with his vociferous dog these past two nights. A red dome and a white dog with two bright pink mouths. Snow-stuck fur and clothes. Muddy-thawing paws and boots. I took them an extra sleeping bag and a hot water bottle - as the night is charged with ice - cold like a stab of hope; cool, like a streak of courage and thin-grinning as the sliver of waxing hours past a new moon destined to be rising beyond the wind freeze and sky-brushing trees.

Wandering in the Hope Valley. 18th March 2018.

Thank you. Hope works 18th March 2018.

Hang-gliding shelf. Bradwell Edge. 17th March 2018.

17th March 2018. Hope Valley. Above Bradwell looking towards Foolow.