The End.

No matter how painful the parting, times of farewell cascade through life as naturally as the seasons - summer dipping into autumn and the bitter winds of winter scattering the joyful spring memories.

Our conversation is filled with the golden weight of remembrance as a year of beauty unfolds behind us. A thick tapestry of experiences, of learning and growing, in faith and love and joy. With threads of heartache and happiness weaving scarlet and golden amongst the fresh emerald green of precious friends, a deep azure blue breaks my heart with goodbyes.

I have so much to look forward to - moving to New Zealand to do another voluntary year with CAP, new friends, amazing experiences, fantastic places to see yet there is also so much here I have to give up, so much to let go, so many dear friends to leave.

Yet this is where it ends...with fragrant halcyon flowers bending their heavy heads beneath the wash of bleak farewells as the final week turns into the final day, the final hour, the final goodby.

And I realise...

"How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard."

Summer

The morning is clement, warm cerulean skies shine softly and the satin fragrance of summer flowers is swirled on the silken tendrils of a July breeze.

As I walk to work the horizon clogs with pillow-like clouds, building turrets and fortifications of nebulosity in creamy grey billows, a sure promise of summer storms.

On a busy main road a subtle pink dog rose nods it's friendly head and I drink in its sweet, clear perfume like nectar.
The pure, green smell of freshly cut grass sounds like the lazy drone of the bumblebee as it hovers over a particularly delectable daisy and butterflies billow round the purple spears of Buddleia trees.

Summer creeps in on days of mellifluous beauty and the dulcet strains of June and July slumber by on honeyed weekends.
It is a shock as we realise we only have three more precious weeks left here at CAP and in Bradford.

"But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possesion of the fair though owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
(Sonnet XVIII, Shakespeare)