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It grows larger

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The house

It grows larger
wall after wall
sliding
on some miraculous arrangement
of panels,
blond and weightless
as balsa, making space
for windows,alcoves,
more rooms, stairways
and passages,all
bathed
in light,with here
and there the green
flower of a tree,
vines,streams
casually
breaking through-
what a change
from the cramped
room at the centre
where I began,where i crouched
and was safe,
but could hardly
breathe! Day after day
I labour at it;
night after night
I keep going-
I'm clearing new ground
I'm lugging boards
I'm measuring,
I'm hanging sheets of glass
I'm nailing down the hardwoods
The thresholds-
I'm hinging the doors-
Once they are up they will lift
their easy latches, they will open
like wings.

Mary Oliver from Dream works 1986

I came across this poem by Mary Oliver in 2009,long before any thought of starting a new life elsewhere came to mind. I thought it beautiful and loved its spaciousness. I felt my heart expanding as I read and reread it.

The imagery is of course, not limited to the actual building of a house, but in our case, when I read it again today, it seems to give words to our experience here at Barrowfield.

Quite literally we are opening up spaces for our crafts, planning better facilities for guests, dreaming of a huge kitchen garden enclosed by the old stone walls.

On Sunday we went in search of a waterfall in the Womenii river that flows past our home. We found it downstream, falling many meters down the cliffs where the Balele mountains start to give way to open up onto the plains of Kwa-Zulu Natal. In summer it must be a spectacle to behold and with a natural swimming pool to dream of. We followed the river back to below the house, in awe of the beauty so readily available to us.

Our life here is opening up, the dream a reality to work towards. Every day, in so many ways we feel this: It grows larger.

Matilda

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