Return to Ankerwycke

I was going to post some paintings of fireworks today but almost everything I found was pretty lame. There's more to fireworks to colour and sunburst shapes - where are the movement and the energy and the violence and temperature and the gone-in-a-heartbeat qualities of them?

So anyway, I've been back to Ankerwycke to see what its like in autumn, so you'll have to  make do with that instead!

It still carries an overwhelming sense of strangeness. I know I'm not the only person to think this; people keep leaving things and placing things and rearranging fallen wood so I guess they not only know the strangeness but they like it and choose to add to it. I think I've worked something out about the place; it has the same effect on me as whisky. Whisky is one of very few things I won't drink, because it amplifies my moods. Ankerwycke has this same power; it can draw out my sadness or my curiosity or the simple pleasure I take in being or whatever else I'm feeling.

A visit to the dark side

I took another walk to Ankerwycke over the weekend, the National Trust land on the opposite bank of the river from Runnymede. I still can't either get over or articulate how different yet the same it is. Deeper, darker, danker. It is clammier. It smells different. It feels different underfoot. Unseen creatures are somehow louder, and there a few unfamiliar bird calls. The woods are denser and the meadows are smaller so they seem brighter. The mix of trees is different and there are ruined water channels everywhere. It seems ludicrous to be saying this in the 21st century, but Ankerwycke feels like a genuinely spiritual place in a way that Runnymede doesn't. Runnymede's magical, transformative powers come out to play at night but Ankerwycke's are there in broad daylight. As you can see from the pictures, its strangeness infects me.

Here be Pagans

I promised some pictures while I'm sorting myself out and here they are.

I have long known that Runnymede has a sister, another National Trust property on the opposite bank of the Thames. I had heard things about it; an ancient yew tree, a ruined priory. I hadn't bothered walking over there though. After all you can see parts of the ruins from my bank and ancient yews are far from news to me. That was a spectacular misjudgement. I have now been and nothing could have prepared me for how different the place feels. They are both managed by the same people but Ankerwycke, as it is called, feels infinitely wilder, rawer and more mysterious. The path leads one over causeways between marshy areas and ruined water management systems associated with the priory, through a woodland far more chaotic than my own. Suddenly one reaches the Thames but it takes a moment to recognise it - looking at the Pleasure Grounds the manicured quality is in stark contrast to the Ankerwycke bank. The path then dives back through glades of yews and between pockets of dark water to the ruins and then finally the yew.

It is plain that the Ankerwycke Yew is an important pagan site. Yews are tightly woven into English spiritual life and folklore and have been since the earliest written accounts of this country. 2000 years old and broader than it is tall, this one has seen everything. Every branch, nook and cranny within reach of the ground is bedecked with ribbons, pictures of people, pieces of paper with either names or messages on, spring flowers, wreaths, animal symbols, sticks from other trees with buds on and garlands. Some have rotted and dried until they're barely there, others are fresh. Who knows what people think they were making offerings to, but making offerings they were. In spite of being festooned with symbols of life and renewal, this place of hope and remembrance is dark and difficult. I have rarely been so glad to feel the sun as I was when I walked away. This tree is going on my to do list of paintings.

Anyway, the pictures: