The Art of Deer Stalking
Fixed fire: blades forged in fire, revenge, steadfastness
For the proper adherence to ritual we had shaved our hair ultra-close, and smeared on a square of silver zinc.
Oceanic Feelings
Cardinal water: oceanic feelings, water, psychoanalysis, intimacy.
I was an adult when I learned to swim, and I think that is why water is troubling and desirable to me, and why it appears in so many of my dreams and visions.
strangeness in the lake
Cardinal water: strange tides, lovers, deep waters
This is a story written as a liminal space, but this intensifies, rather than diminishes the terror.
The Sky Became the Perfect Colour and Back Again
Mutable air: the inner sky, imagination, psychosis
The water came in waves and washed gold summer through her bones. He was above her again, his hair deep silk on her face.
The tender antagonist
Mutable air: internal contradictions, tenderness, creative solutions.
The relief of facing something is so much greater than the temporary balm of running away.
Voice and Style
Mutable air: research, reflection, voice
You unearth your work like an archaeologist discovers treasures, or a farmer pulls up crops.
Poison Apples and Writing Myths
Mutable air: circulation of ideas, intrusive thoughts, risk-taking
There is something so compelling abut the poison apple; it is sweeter, juicier, shinier, and a deeper colour than any other fruit. But its seductive appeal means that it is easy to ignore the fatal aspects.
Everyday Witchcraft in Sian S. Rathore’s Wild Heather
Fixed earth: wild animals, practical witchcraft, poetry
Rathore’s poem ‘Alison Device (1594-1612), named for a Pendle witch, is a beautiful meditation on mortality and desire.
Weird England
Fixed earth: ancient Norfolk flint, deep time, sacred herbs, soporific lettuces, and chilly beaches.
The landscape is dry in its lunar whiteness, with heaps of cracked inky flint in the pale wash of sky.
lying on the laundry with wet hair
Fixed earth: surrender, cocooning, deep rest
There are ways to move into a different plane of time - meditation, music, psychedelics, movement, reading, having a crush, eating a whole bowl of cherries very slowly.
peonies and creative containers
Fixed Earth: containers, support, grounding
Some people see the container as a capacious space to experiment in, and some people feel it is a barrier that needs to be broken down.
The Cocoon of Writing
Fixed earth: salt crystals, haunted forests, deep rest
The cocoon is not about shame and fear and perfection but it does allow those elements to be held; it contains multitudes. It allows those things to decay and to be renewed. It is miraculous.
Sensitivity and art
Fixed earth: sensitivity, grounding, sensuality
It was Kali Malone’s core artistic principle, ‘cherish sensitivity’, that helped me to think about sensitivity as one of my most precious resources.
Three Tarot Essays
Cardinal Fire: deity, divination, world-yielding
The bridge between deity and humanity isn’t so special, we call it dying
Distilling the Themes of a Story
Cardinal fire: prismatic storytelling, intensity, wholeness
The film is formally beautiful. Long, slow takes. The drama of light through a circular window. The harrowing beauty of autumn leaves against a whitewashed exterior. Mortality is conjured in the changes of seasons, and the gradations of light.
A Match is Struck: on Writing the Present
Cardinal fire: immediacy, fire, creativity.
Unlike the click of a lighter, a match creates a suspended moment in time. The weight in the hand, the sound of the strike, the little fire glowing, and the curl of extinguished smoke.