The duties of a temple warden are effectively without limit. The list of jobs that need doing seems to stretch as far as the imagination of an archimandrite can reach. But one of the main duties is ensuring that the building remains clean. Now obviously this can be easily achieved. A simple task to issue … More Getting the bird
This is another of those episodes from Maljie’s life that I heard from Laxey, the sub-Hierodeacon. It was just after he returned from his week-long silent retreat. Given that the food had been basically vegetables in one form or another, he was cutting himself thick slices of mott ham with the determined air of a … More The intricacies of livestock husbandry
It has to be said that I never heard this tale of Maljie’s past from the lady in person. This one I had from Laxey, the sub-Hierodeacon. It has to be confessed that like Temple Wardens, the various levels of the hierodeaconate are chosen not for their overwhelming spirituality, but because they are useful when … More Feeding the fishes
It’s not often Tallis agrees to be interviewed, indeed he’s often somewhat reticent when it comes to answering questions about his past. Still on this occasion, perhaps because the wine was better than average or the company was such as to encourage loquacity, he seems to have opened up a little. Yet to be fair, … More An interview with Tallis Steelyard
I suppose that in one way, poets and painters have one specific thing in common. We sketch out the original work, then we work away at it until it is mostly finished. Finally comes the endless tweaking to get it just right. So if I mention that Julatine Sypent can be something of a perfectionist … More A cosy dinner for three
Every so often you come across a paradox. For example I was once talking to an old friend of Maljie’s and they mentioned, “The cathartic effect of mindless violence.” But surely if it’s cathartic, it isn’t mindless, it’s done for a purpose? But there again, if it isn’t mindless violence, is it cathartic? Still I … More Don’t let the grass grow under your feet.
I must confess that I rarely gain any benefit from the dreams I have that I remember upon waking. Some seem to have me in long and convoluted discussions with people who are dead or whom I am aware of but have never met. In some I seem to be travelling through strange places for … More To sleep, perchance to write
Tallis Steelyard 