WOTblog

By Sally Wells For me September is the time that really feels like a new year. Everyone rolls back from their summer adventures, suntans are flaunted, holiday stories swapped. Kids go back to school, wearing their winter uniforms, and grown-ups grab an adult education institute’s prospectus to choose a slice or two of enrichment for the autumn. It’s thrilling to be torn between Indian massage techniques or life drawing, or jewellery design, or beginners’ Italian, or choir, or.... there are nearly as many courses as leaves falling from the trees. It’s almost October now and we’re having an Indian summer. London’s parks are beautiful, full of crackling beds of leaves to scrunch through, and shining conkers to gather. We gathered about three kilos of them on Saturday, and scooted home in the golden light of a low sun, the air so crisp and fresh. It didn’t feel at all like the city centre of the city; in fact I was reminded of my Mediterranean home, and days of big sweaters and sunglasses,...

A Villanelle composed by the participants of Women On Tour's creative writing holiday who, inspired by the place and the Spanish red wine wrote this: In the hills the sun will shine while we slave and work and write and later on we’ll have some wine. Outside, the breeze brings scents of thyme and our writing takes to flight in the hills. The sun will shine and the shepherd’s bell will chime and the plain will flood with light and later on we’ll have some wine. We are looking for a sign and, even if it’s out of sight, in the hills the sun will shine as we write this line by line trusting end will come by night so later on we’ll have some wine, but in the meantime here’s our rhyme in this casa in the light in the hills, the sun will shine and, later on, we’ll have some wine.