I've always associated the moment of writing with a moment of lift, of joy, of unexpected reward.

Hope for a great sea-change timid to rebuke and too petty to forgive.

I drink to keep body and soul apart.

Walk on air against your better judgement.

Im a firm believer in learning by heart.

No bit of the natural world is more valuable or more vulnerable than the tree bit. Nothing is more like ourselves, standing upright, caught between heaven and earth, frail at the extremities, yet strong at the central trunk, and nothing is closer to us at the beginning and at the end, providing the timber boards that frame both the cradle and the coffin.

Once off the bush The fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour. I always felt like crying. It wasn't fair That all the lovely canfuls smelt of rot. Each year I hoped they'd keep, knew they would not. -Blackberry picking