ECHO 18/12/05

8am Sunday – moon one half loads silver – temperature below zero – Fieldfare first – the sun just threatening behind Badger’s Hill – Starlings gather in a naked tree, silhouetted against the grey – crows and rooks call but all else is silence – walking on with face numb and fingertips itchy with cold, through Fields Farm where the Wagtails chatter and flit over frozen churned mud - and rising the small crest beyond – looking back over the way I came and the view is clear through to the Malverns where the houses shine in the low sun, tin y orange markers above the irregular mist line – the sheep are in the light and other landmarks now begin to glow in the dawn: church spires, copses etc. Voices heard but no-one seen, a grandmother encouraging a child to get a move on – across the country lane and on into the golf course where the V-sweatered men are gathering for their little challenges and business deals without wives and they gaze upon me like I am some alien as I hike on through in my greens, my cap pulled on tight and eyes scanning – beyond this the land rises sharply up onto the hill and turning into the filed at the top, beside the dense woodland, three Buzzards scatter lazily from roost, close, from my disturbance – each takes a compass point and soars upon it –