by Steve Tanham
Kendal, midweek… the retail day was drawing to a close. A thin fog had covered the town and its surrounding hills for most of the day, and the encroaching darkness at the end of the afternoon made the gloom seem even more dense. I have always been drawn by urban photos of streets where the lights have that ‘just turned on’ look. Collie in … Read More The Light and the Gloom
+ #Collie dogs, #Silenti, Ancient Landscapes, Photographic techniques, Photography, Silent Eye School
by Steve Tanham
Our small village, Sedgwick, near Kendal, has a landscape shaped in the classic terminal topography of ancient glaciers. This area of gentle, rounded hills is typical of the final stages of the glacier’s course. The English Lake District, where we live, has them in abundance. ‘Basket of Eggs’ is another term you may remember from those geography text books at school. They are also … Read More The hill with two stations
by Steve Tanham
I am not a tidy person. My wife, Bernie, is much better than I am but even she admits that, as a couple, we have to work at it. At the bottom of our garden is a large stone building called ‘The Saltpetre’. Built around 1820, this ‘expense magazine’ (and no, I haven’t just made that up) used to house gunpowder awaiting transportation the … Read More Locked-down and Armed: one man’s struggle with entropy (1)
by Steve Tanham
I will not tread upon your words Whose worth is in these hills and lakes Where golden flowers charmed the breeze That carried you to greatness ➰ But armed with eyes of fingered glass Which sense and frame intensity I reach into the now of gold To capture black’s propensity ➰ To frame in light what lies beyond And host a soul that only … Read More Light on Black
by Steve Tanham
The A66 road connects east and west across northern England and runs through some of the highest parts of the Pennine Hills. Notorious for its severe winter winds that topple heavy wagons, it’s also very beautiful. Here, at its western end, this fast road soars across the glacial landscape, up and down like a bird of prey, before dropping us onto a scene of … Read More #ShortWritz: End of the Road
by Steve Tanham
Christmas Eve, a lost near-blind dog escaped onto the fells… and a head-torch… What could possible go more wrong?
by Steve Tanham
Stagshaw Garden is a sloping woodland garden of approximately eight acres. It is located on a steep slope named Skelghyll Fell on the north-eastern shores of Windermere, England’s largest lake. The area around Windermere is considered the centre of the Lake District. The word ‘Lakeland’ has become a normal way of referring, locally, to the Lake District. Most of the Lake District is protected … Read More Stagshaw Garden
by Steve Tanham
By wind and mere and rippled flow And water’s mirror, sunlight’s glow To farther hills whose skin embraces Touching sky with changing faces Who sees the round but loves the whole And wrestles with that spirit’s capture Here sits the poet, lost in rapture ©️Stephen Tanham Stephen Tanham is a director of the Silent Eye School of Consciousness, a not-for-profit organisation that helps people find … Read More Here sits the poet, lost in rapture…
by Steve Tanham
It’s a station on the North-West main line – ‘Oxenholme’ is how it is really written. If you set quiz questions, it’s a good one: what’s the only main line station in Britain to be found in a village? Oxenholme is really on the outskirts of Kendal – as close as the main north-south line to Glasgow gets, but there’s another station in … Read More Oxen Home
by Steve Tanham
I should have known, I tell myself – as the torrential rain comes at me sideways and immediately drenches my black corduroy trousers, that it was going to be one of those days. Note to self: cords and heavy rain do not a happy camper make… Not that I’m camping. It’s a normal, February, Saturday morning in South Lakeland and the rain has … Read More Agents of the Deluge
Sun in Gemini 