lighting the stove
a salmon follows the stars
on the river
© Xenia Tran
Wishing you all a blessed Sunday and a peaceful week ahead,
with love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Stars on the River was first published in The Bamboo Hut, Number 3, 2021. A warm-hearted thank you to Steve Wilkinson for featuring my poem and putting this beautiful edition together.
Weekly Prompts Weekend Challenge: Home
Lens-Artists Weekly Photo Challenge #169: The Ordinary
Wishing you all a blessed Sunday and a peaceful new week,
with love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Weekly Prompts Weekend Challenge: Sanctuary
The seven cygnets nesting on our river are ten weeks old today and the first white feathers are beginning to show.
You can see them at one week old in our earlier post Welcome to the World.
Wishing you all a blessed Sunday and a peaceful week ahead,
with love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Weekly Prompts Weekend Challenge: The Bend
It was a true delight to see our local swans with seven one-week old cygnets on the river yesterday.
Wishing you all a blessed Sunday and a peaceful week ahead,
with love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Settings: f/5 – 1/320 s – ISO 200, f/5.6 – 1/800 s – ISO 200 and f/5.6 – 1/640 s – ISO 200.
We are deeply honoured and delighted that the second photograph above has been included in the Nairn River Swans & Waterfowl Trust’s 2022 Calendar. A warm-hearted thank you to Joe Telfer for all his work and to Iona Gibson for putting this beautiful calendar together.
Weekly Prompts Weekend Challenge: Favourites
Wishing you all a wonderful Wednesday,
with love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Camera: Canon Powershot SX60 HS, Settings: f/5.6 – 1/1000 s – ISO 200, f/5 – 1/250 s – ISO 125 and f/4 – 1/1000 s – ISO 200.
Weekly Prompt Wednesday Challenge: Autumn Strolls
Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Orange and Green
Create a sanctuary within yourself where you can go anytime you want to
(Shakti Gawain)
Your sanctuary is your ideal place of relaxation, tranquillity and safety and you can create it exactly as you want it (Shakti Gawain)
Welcome to the Lens-Artists Weekly Photo Challenge, where Patti, Tina, Amy and Ann-Christine kindly invited me to guest-host this week.
Here in the Scottish Highlands we spent more than a hundred days in lockdown where both our home and our community became our sanctuary during the Covid-19 crisis.
We are blessed that we live in a loving home and in a caring community. We have been reaching out to those who are less fortunate, those for whom home is not the safest place to be.
These people have been offered sanctuary with another loving family, with extended family members, neighbours, teachers or in solitude.
Sanctuary can be found and created in a garden, a park, a field of wild flowers and by the sea …
… watching wildlife, listening to birdsong …
… along the forest trails and in the mountains.
This week we invite you to share what Sanctuary means to you, where you find it or how you create your place of calm and healing. In your post, please make sure you include a link to this challenge and use the Lens-Artists tag so we can find your post in the WP Reader.
Last week, you shared your wonderful images of Winter for Ann-Christine’s challenge. Many thanks Ann-Christine for hosting last week’s challenge and to all of you who contributed your amazing images of this beautiful season of snow and contemplation.
Have you seen these?
What’s up next week? Stay tuned on 8 August when Amy will be hosting LAPC #109.
Wishing you all a wonderful and creative week ahead and I look forward to your submissions!
With love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Lens-Artists Weekly Photo Challenge #108: Sanctuary
Word of the Day Challenge: Introducing
meeting again
butterbeans and lovage
on solstice day
© Xenia Tran
This has been a regular dish for us during the lockdown, once fresh tomatoes and spinach were available. We experimented with many different seasonings and lovage became our favourite.
This haiku was first published in Haiku Dialogue: The Way of the Chef, Troutswirl, The Haiku Foundation Blog, 24 June 2020. A very big thank you to guest editor Craig Kittner and post manager Lori Zajkowski for featuring my poem and putting this beautiful edition together.
Thank you again for all your good wishes before we went on our blogging break and we hope you had a lovely week and Solstice too!
Wishing you all a wonderful Wednesday,
with love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Camera: Panasonic Lumix FZ200, Settings: f/2.8 – 1/25 s – ISO 100 and f/2.8 – 1/10 s – ISO 800.
Frank J Tassone’s Weekly Haikai Challenge #144: Summer Solstice
Jez Braithwaite’s Fan Of … #73: Taking a Break
Word of the Day Challenge: Celebration
A further selection of recent publications in online and print journals can be found here:
One of the pastimes my husband and I enjoy during this lockdown is going through old photographs of places we visited.
On a beautiful day in December 2019 we drove to the small fishing village of Findochty on the Moray Coast. We chatted with some friendly local people, walked around with our dogs and took a few photographs. It was the first time we had come here in Winter and we loved the beauty of the light in the cold air. I wrote a few poems while we were there, including this one.
Most of the sailing boats are on the quayside, masts folded. Fresh paintwork glitters in the morning sun. There is still the odd ice patch, in the shadows of the harbour. A small dog slips as he scampers up the brae.
watching over us
a seated fisherman
full of stories
my eyes begin to wander
past the lighthouse, out to sea
© Xenia Tran
The Pier at Findochty was first published in Ribbons, Winter 2020: Volume 16, Number 1. A very big thank you to Susan Weaver and the team at Ribbons for featuring my poem and putting this beautiful edition together.
Wishing you all a blessed Sunday and a peaceful week ahead,
with love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Camera: Canon Powershot SX60 HS, Settings: f/4 – 1/640 s – ISO 160, f/4.5 – 1/1000 s – ISO 200 and f/5 – 1/1000 s – ISO 160.
Lens-Artists Weekly Photo Challenge #97: Pastimes
dVerse Poets MTN: 5-Line Japanese Poetic Forms
A further selection of recent publications in online and print journals can be found here:
I am writing while we’re in lockdown. Panic buyers empty the shops, leaving less for all of us. Still I feel calm. We’ve been able to eat the food nobody wanted. We’ve adapted recipes, combining flavours like never before. We’re making everything last, stretch our resources. And I feel calm. I have never been afraid of dying.
the crow so wise
sees the centre of the surf
in rainbows
I’ve never felt more at peace
preparing to go home
© Xenia Tran
Please be assured that I am feeling well. I have always regarded this journey through life as exactly that, a journey. I also believe there will be other journeys after this. I am treasuring my experiences and sharing what I see.
Wishing you all a peaceful Wednesday,
with love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Settings: f/5.6 – 1/400 – ISO 100 and f/2.8 – 1/200 s – ISO 100.
dVerse Poetics: Now I Can See …
Rag Tag Daily Prompt: Scry
Tracy’s Corvid 2020 Challenge #1
Jez Braithwaite’s Lensball Playtime #6
The criss-cross waves of high water tell us the tide is turning. Returning to the mouth of the river, the cygnets carry a glimpse of the sea. The pen is doing what she has always done. Prepare her young for the wider world, showing them where and when to feed. Her cob swims quietly by her side, creating an easy slipstream for cygnets who swim behind them. When the current becomes too strong they climb on their mother’s back.
We stand and watch them glide by and thank them for our own glimpse into another world. I am enchanted by their deep communication and understanding. Everything is done in total silence. Neither the cygnets nor their parents make a single sound. All I can hear is our smile.
all by themselves
lilies of the valley bloom
in nature’s garden
© Xenia Tran
We wish you all a very happy Monday and a wonderful new week!
With love from Xenia xxx
Photographs by Xenia Tran, edited in lr.
Daily Prompt: Ceremony
Daily Post Weekly Photo Challenge: All-time Favorites
dVerse Haibun Monday: Silent Sounds
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