BLOOMING BRILLIANT

The graveyard at Fanore

BRIGHT AND BEAUTIFUL

I think May has to be one of my favourite months as the Springtime takes root and the jaded scenarios of winter are endued with a fresh and vibrant mantle. It’s God’s great outdoor paint job when everything that grows becomes new and noticeable again. This year the May blossom (or hawthorn) made a late appearance at the end of the month ,but when it showed it most surely did not disappoint. Here are just a few examples of the dazzling views that this years month of May has delivered, for some of them I wandered into the fist few days of June !

This exotic flower appeared across the road from my place drooping from an electric-light pole. Perhaps some kind Dew reader may be able to identify it, the flowers are purple and it seems to me like some kind of willow. Under bright sunshine it really is quite a spectacular sight that brightens up an otherwise drab suburban road.

I made my first trip of 2010 to the Burren today ,and spent several hours just soaking in the atmosphere of this unique area on the edge of the Atlantic . The distinctive limestone terrain plays host to a wide variety of rare flora uniquely found here, often growing in the clefts of the great limestone slabs where they find shelter from the sea winds. While there I visited the graveyard at Fanore where John O’Donnohue is laid to rest, and later found a space among the Burren stones to seclude myself for a few hours with a book.

Gerard O'Shea