October musings

It feels darker now; Summer is only memory and the Winter is just a breath of wind away. I look like I am day dreaming, but my mind is whirling, full of thoughts that don’t quite make it out.

I count eight blue tits hopping through the bare branches below my window, bright spots of blue and yellow against brown and grey.

The sparrows play with them, brown wings fluttering like so many dried leaves rolling through the air.

Above the willows, starlings and jackdaws soar and swoop playfully in gusts of wind, their raucous calls echoing down to my studio. Tattered crows perch on chimney pots, and I count magpies hoping for luck.

Tiny murmurations swoop past in the evening, preparing for the clouds of starlings making their way to us, across the North Sea. Lines of birds twitter and chirrup along the rooftops, suddenly disturbed and rising into the air in a flurry of wings.

Their wings are like my thoughts, fluttering and whisking away too fast to quite catch hold of. Colours swirl, my brush swoops, clouds of Indian ink spread wetly, granulating with the paint.