177 Summer meadow woodland edge

Radio Lento podcast

You find yourself, suddenly out. On the other side of the wood.
The edge, of a wide open empty field. A meadow.
Tall elegant trees, given way to a high, bright sky.

Standing silently. You can feel the heart of the forest behind you. Hear its echoes. Its leaves near and far, rustling. How one tree creaks. How banks of soft summer air move spatially across the treetops. How trains, passing distantly through the forest, make sound like silver wind.

In front, is open grassland. Fragrant. Home to large populations of butterflies. And that sings, with the sound of stridulating crickets. Hundreds. Thousands. All cricketing, under this warm noon day sun.

This meadow. These slowly swaying trees. This breeze, in the leaves and grasses. This feeling, of being so near to the cool green heart of this forest. And up, at the sky. And up, at the sun. And the shifting clouds. And the planes, flying from time to time. Flying, from cloud to cloud.

* We travelled into Hertfordshire (by train and on foot of course) to take this sound photograph from as near as possible to the Clinton Baker Pinetum one lunchtime last week. It's a fascinating place, rich for forest bathing, first planted in 1767. We want to take some more sound photographs that capture the range of tree species inside the pinetum if and when we can get permission.