To the Waters and the Wild

Glencar Waterfall, watercolour on Arches paper

On occasion, I find myself in the phlebotomy department of St. James’s Hospital, (not as bad as it sounds) and it occurred to me recently that the walls there were a bit bare, a bit lacking in inspiration, lacking indeed, in any kind of aesthetic stimulation, so I thought that something should be done about it.

Now, judging by the big hole in the ground outside (and not to mention the big hole in their finances), it is possible that “aesthetic stimulation” is not high on the list of priorities at the moment…

Still, it’s better to light a candle rather than curse the dark – so now, as patients while away their time in this draining medical domain, my waterfall painting might remind them of the poem by William Butler Yeats:   The Stolen Child – a verse of which I include below…

Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glencar,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping
than you can understand.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Stolen_Child

https://www.oliviercornetgallery.com/

http://www.stjames.ie/

http://www.newchildrenshospital.ie/