My three-year-old grandson has been staying with me this week. It was his joy of unearthing fresh potatoes with his bare hands that I was thinking about when I planted my ‘first earlies’ on Good Friday. Now they are ready, and he is here. The pure pleasure of a moment planned for and grown in allotment compost. Gathering enough for our supper didn’t take long and we cut them fine in rounds to fry in olive oil to accompany roast leg of lamb together with fresh green mange touts harvested from the plants growing in pots at the front of my house.

After he had gone to bed, I walked along the lane. The evening fields were full of rabbits grazing, and a hare sprung up from the meadow to lollop away downslope. I stopped to watch it and noticed two young leverets crouched, hiding in the grass. I guess they were hoping that I’d be distracted by the full-grown hare running away and not notice them.

On the steep bit of the lane as it goes up to the moor there are grassy banks edged by gorse and rich in wildflowers. The delicate and discrete Enchanter’s Nightshade is flowering at the moment. It’s easy to overlook but once you know the name it gains a special significance. Its Latin name, Circaea, comes from the goddess Circe, daughter of the sun god Helios and sea nymph Perse, who would use potions of herbs and a magic wand to transform her enemies into animals.

Thoughtfully chosen words can transform the way we see and experience things. This month there have been a series of radio programmes on BBC Radio 3 about the Northern Irish poet Michael Longley. My favourite amongst them is the one in which he describes his visits to Carrigskeewaun in Country Mayo where he holidays in the cottage of a bird watching friend. The poems he reads are rich with his love and immersion in nature. Here are a few lines from his poem ‘The Leveret’.

Tomorrow I’ll introduce you to the sea,

Little hoplite. Have you been missing it?

I’ll park your chariot by the otters’ rock

And carry you over seaweed to the sea.

I’m on my annual holiday in the Outer Hebrides so won’t be able to reply to comments. Yesterday I was up early, said goodbye to family, and made the long drive from the Yorkshire moors to catch the late afternoon ferry over the Minch to Stornaway. This morning I’m looking out over pale turquoise sea, rocky headlands and sands with the calls of oyster catchers and snipe in the blustery wind. Last night when I arrived there was a young stag on the track standing still on the bluff that shelters the cottage, watching me in curiosity without fear.

Rowan on the Moor

A Moodscope member

In case you’d like to listen to it, here is the link to the radio programme:

Poems of Mayo – Michael Longley’s Life of Poetry

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0020px5