Grasping the nettle......
Obviously this saying stems from the idea that if you grasp the nettle very firmly, it will not sting you - equally obviously the sayers had not met the viscious b****r who persists beneath my bay tree - the best stinger in the land........
As children we believed that rubbing dock leaves on nettle-stings, helped the pain, and it was considered fotunate that they grew in much the same places!
The Road Through the Nettles.
Summer nettles, head high, hid the path from view.
Each year we trod the way anew.
The openness of winter, held, for us, no interest.
The risk of stinging pains, necessary to our childish minds,
lent excitement to our games.
In spring this old allotment, long disused,
came into life with tall yellow tulips,
discarded bulbs thrown out with garden weeds.
And flowering aconites, green and gold,
grew on the common rubbish heap close to the track.
But best of all, this summer rite of treading nettles
to the old brick wall,
relic of an ancient pigsty in the corner
beneath the twisted tree.
Here we played for days on end until, suddenly bored,
moved on to the hollowed hedges,
or to the sandpits in the field,
or to the blackened willow still in growth
despite its burnt out heart.
Here it was, I fell, rolling over,
bare-armed in the elder-scented heat,
stung beyond the help of docken leaves.
Here too, my cousin
stamped life from a fledgling bird, newly hatched,
while we girls watched in speechless shock.
Not for him the usual mindless cruelty of small boys,
tearing wings from butterflies, and tormenting frogs.
We never spoke of it again,
but now, long after his own death, I wonder
if the path to self-destruction began, for him
on this summer
nettle day.
Image manipulation
Grasping the nettle......
Obviously this saying stems from the idea that if you grasp the nettle very firmly, it will not sting you - equally obviously the sayers had not met the viscious b****r who persists beneath my bay tree - the best stinger in the land........
As children we believed that rubbing dock leaves on nettle-stings, helped the pain, and it was considered fotunate that they grew in much the same places!
The Road Through the Nettles.
Summer nettles, head high, hid the path from view.
Each year we trod the way anew.
The openness of winter, held, for us, no interest.
The risk of stinging pains, necessary to our childish minds,
lent excitement to our games.
In spring this old allotment, long disused,
came into life with tall yellow tulips,
discarded bulbs thrown out with garden weeds.
And flowering aconites, green and gold,
grew on the common rubbish heap close to the track.
But best of all, this summer rite of treading nettles
to the old brick wall,
relic of an ancient pigsty in the corner
beneath the twisted tree.
Here we played for days on end until, suddenly bored,
moved on to the hollowed hedges,
or to the sandpits in the field,
or to the blackened willow still in growth
despite its burnt out heart.
Here it was, I fell, rolling over,
bare-armed in the elder-scented heat,
stung beyond the help of docken leaves.
Here too, my cousin
stamped life from a fledgling bird, newly hatched,
while we girls watched in speechless shock.
Not for him the usual mindless cruelty of small boys,
tearing wings from butterflies, and tormenting frogs.
We never spoke of it again,
but now, long after his own death, I wonder
if the path to self-destruction began, for him
on this summer
nettle day.
Image manipulation