Yesterday we headed over to Walsall, and went to our first ever wassail, at Caldmore Community Garden. If you’re wondering what a wassail is – and we had only the vaguest idea before yesterday – it’s a traditional event held at this time of year during which apple trees are ceremonially awoken, and bad spirits scared away, after which everyone gathers round a campfire to warm up, possibly by drinking mulled cider because January can be bitterly cold (and in this case, was).
We were also in Caldmore to celebrate the launch of the garden’s poetry trail. Over the autumn, we’ve led a series of workshops – funded by Black Country Touring – encouraging people to visit the gardens and have a go at writing poems about the natural world they see around them. It’s been a lot of fun, which prompted the creation of some truly beautiful work. Job done. Or, as it turned out, not quite done. Inspired by the poems they’d seen created, the staff at the garden decided that some of the pieces should be displayed in a poetry trail and become a permanent feature in this urban oasis.
There are now more than seventy poems squirrelled around Caldmore Community Garden, and everybody who participated in the workshops will see their work represented there. If that doesn’t warm your cockles on a cold January evening, we don’t know what will.
PPP
19th January 2025