A fruitful rest

a-fruitful-rest

A fruitful rest? Somehow this tips on its head all our culture tries to tell us. That we earn fruitfulness, that it only comes through striving. And rest is a means to an end. But what if we’ve misunderstood the very nature of life? THE FECUND FALLOW And what if all this waiting;this trembling body … Read more

What is the harvest for?

what-is-the-harvest-for

If we pick every flower, what is left for passers-by to savour? And if harvesting fields, orchards, vineyards, and woods takes everything, what about the next generation of growth? Where will it come from? Our cycles for judging fruitfulness and success have become catastrophically short-term, and the consequences are all around. We think we have … Read more

The challenge of entangled fruitfulness

the-challenge-of-entangled-fruitfulness

How do you pick your plums, apples, or any fruit you eat? You likely take them off the supermarket shelf, ready selected and potentially wrapped. And because most of our fruit is grown in highly engineered monoculture, picking will be a uniform, mechanically assisted process. But at what cost? There’s an obvious cost to the … Read more

The time of ripening

the-time-of-ripening

These are delicious Victoria plums from my home county of Kent, the ‘Garden of England’. Their fragrant smell and juicy, sweet taste remind me of the fruit farm where I grew up. They are extraordinarily evocative. For the last few weeks, we’ve been able to buy tree-ripened plums. Yet these last few are verging on … Read more

Free, and yet not alone

free-and-yet-not-alone

None of us can produce good fruit on our own. Even when we’ve let go of the identities and ideas, the things and the memories that have previously defined us, we are still not alone. Every creative idea, each insight, whatever is healthy and lovely, is the product of some form of germination. And has … Read more