The sun is a foreign thing, rising surprisingly from a puffy cloud on the Irish sea, limpid, lucent and pale, pale golden; a strange foreign thing, washing itself through rushes of rain as the car ferry reaches the shore, then flooding the low southern fields till all is glowing, green glowing, like a secret spring in the middle of winter.
Four, five, six weeks, we’ve had a drought of light, living dimly in the grey-ceilinged cloud of our Welsh valley, yet over here on Irish shores we are travelling the day with this bright foreign thing, following its arc as it slowly unwinds around the gentle Irish slopes, and gratefully soaking in its warm lustre.
It cools though, as it unwinds, as it gradually wanes, now sinking over the tidal river, tangling itself in the dark brown trees, anchoring itself in the muddy earthen banks. Down it goes, its illumination now cold and white. Oh, but still – illumination!
Drake’s Pool, Crosshaven, County Cork, Ireland
10th December 2015