Every year, the blossom of the blackthorn amazes me. Its white is so undiluted, as if, when its buds break into flowers, with so little colour still in the hedgerows and meadows there is nothing that can taint its purity. Against the dark grey, almost black, of its wood, the profusion of flowers, stamens standing out proud, is just startlingly beautiful.
With a few days of exquisite sunshine, bright blue skies and such warmth, really I should have been out with my camera, photographing the emergence of spring. Too busy, I just didn’t manage it. When I found myself with a moment of calm today, the light was dull, the skies heavy with cloud. Had I missed the moment?
Gazing at one of the youngest blackthorns at Sun Rising, planted as a memorial tree, and flowering with such uninhibited exuberance, I recognised that it was no less amazing than it had been in the sunshine. With the sun’s gold in daffodils beneath and around it, I was washed through with wonder.
In the old mythology of these lands, blackthorn is sacred to the ‘triple goddess’, in other words, perhaps, reminding us of the three stages of womanhood. By the end of the season, with tatty-brown falling leaves and long sharp black thorns, the grumpy old woman sits in silence. Yet earlier in the year she is fruitful, the mother-figure, her branches adorned with the deep purple of sloes. And here she is, another facet of the feminine: the maiden, in pure white, and the innocence and enthusiasm of her natural beauty.
With the blackthorn blossom at its best at Sun Rising right now, other trees are now beginning to flower too. The first wild cherries are starting to bloom – but don’t expect the uncompromising white of the blackthorn. In the cherry flower, I think there’s the slightest tint of cream. The reddish vibrancy of the cherry bark can’t fail but to soften the white of their delicate petals.