Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

 I'd read so many reviews of this book, I'm astonished I'd never picked it up before now! As both a botanist and a poet, I was really drawn to this book and I enjoyed reading it. It braids together various themes of indigenous culture, science (specifically botany and ecology) and the author's own life experiences as a scientist, teacher and mother from an indigenous background. 

I really enjoyed the insights into north American ecologies, particularly Sweetgrass and Black Ash and how indigenous peoples carefully harvested these plants, using every bit of what they harvested, producing baskets and the left overs being used as tinder in fires. 

"The marvel of a basket is in its transformation, its journey from wholeness as a living plant to fragmented strands and back to wholeness as a basket" 

I was very struck by the inspiring case study of ecological restoration that was presented in the book. Onondagaga Lake is a site sacred to the indigenous people who live near it, but became very polluted and is now (at the time of writing) being restored. This case study showed both how Western disregard of nature can almost destroy an ecosystem but how on the other hand the land can be restored using science and indigenous knowledge. 

The book is important in its presentation of a world view that values the land and nature and for showing indigenous peoples living in harmony with the wider environment. We can all learn a lot from the wisdom in this book. 

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, published (2013) by Milkwood Editions.  

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This month is Catch the Bus month, you can read more about that in this week's post on my Crafty Green Poet Substack.  

Super Nature - a film review

Super Nature offers a patchwork of personal meditations on the natural world. Director Ed Sayer collaborated with forty people, all of whom who used antique Super 8 film cameras to record stories of the nature they see around them, with as little travel involved as possible. 

The collaborators include professional filmmakers, conservation rangers and local enthusiasts, which brings an interesting and varied level of skills, expertise and motivations into the end product. Some contributors share how being close to nature is beneficial for their health, others are involved in looking after nature including one of the rangers responsible for the 24/7 care of the last remaining Northern White Rhinos in the world. The film takes us to coral reefs, the Alps, the Pacific Garbage Patch and beaches in Cornwall. 

 

It's a beautifully made film, with a meditative flow to it as it moves from one scene to another (though there are several scenes which you want to last for longer). Shooting it all on Super 8 gives the film a nostalgic feel, that fits with the sense of loss that emerges from several of the scenes. Some contributions, particularly the director's own contributions, do veer towards preaching in parts, but overall it is a love letter to both nature and to Super 8 film. 

 

Super Nature is screening in selected cinemas., including at Edinburgh's Filmhouse (which is where I saw it today). 

Grey Squirrel

 I met this Grey Squirrel today, who was shouting loudly as they tend to do at this time of year. 

 

Figgate Park and Portobello Beach

Yesterday we had a lovely walk, as we almost always do on a Saturday. We started off in Figgate Park, where the pond was covered in waterweed and there were few ducks in sight.  

The crab apple trees were a delight though, full of red fruit that look good enough to eat, but crab apples are generally too sour to eat fresh and need to be made into jelly or wine.   

 

We were amazed by the number of Speckled Wood butterflies in the park, they seemed to be everywhere, 

The wildflower meadows (which have been planted rather than being native meadows) are still vivid  

and supporting a reasonable number of insects, including this Common Carder bee

and this Red Admiral butterfly 

 

Our favourite sighting though was this incredibly well camouflaged Treecreeper

We were also happy to sight a Sparrowhawk soaring above us 

Just as we left the park, a bus turned up that was heading to Portobello so we jumped on for the short ride, had lunch in Portobello and then walked along the promenade to enjoy a sunny afternoon at the seaside. (Portobello was actually much busier than it looks in the photo below!)

 Shared with Nature Notes. 

autumn haiku

autumn sunset—
the cherry tree
on fire

originally published in Sense and Sensibility September 2025  

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If you love seascapes of the west of Scotland, I can definitely recommend Frances MacDonald’s Sea Stories exhibition at the Scottish Gallery. Showing until the end of September.

 

Junk Journaling

Above is the front cover of a wee book I made at a Junk Journaling workshop at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. You can read more about it in the latest post on my Crafty Green Poet Substack. 

Contemplation of Roses by Annest Gwilym

Contemplation of Roses is the latest collection from Welsh poet Annest Gwilym. The opening poem Spring ends:  'birds are loud / in trees shouting begin begin begin' which is very apt as a description of early Spring birdsong and as an opening to a poetry collection. 

The first half of the collection moves through the seasons of the year, from Spring to the 'grey spaces of winter' in Hinterland. These are well observed poems, written with a great eye for detail, I particularly love the 'yellow cartoon feet' of the Little Egret in Season of Roses. All the poems are threaded with beautiful phrases to capture the individual feel of each season, including: 

 The syncopation of air-blue days (Sumer Is Icumen In)

sunwet smell of new roses (The Contemplation of Roses)

Soon the deer will come and shyly stamp out / the last blazing embers of summer. (Early Autumn)

Most poems in the second part focus on lonely people, including the remembered shared loneliness of the height of the COVID pandemic (Remembering Pestilence) and a lonely human sharing an encounter with a deer in The Quiet Night. Home briefly looks at the status of the Welsh language, weaving in images of the natural world:

'brittle on your tongue, slow as lichen, tactile as clay.
The language you dream in, yet cannot write.'

Dear London is an anti-love poem to the city the poet once lived in: 

your wrinkled river, as tired as the moon (Dear London)

Most poems here are free verse, though Dinorwig is a haibun, offering an interesting potted history into the site of a Celtic hill fort and later a quarry. 

The collection is brought to a close with Twilight.  

'On the shore of night,
my pebbled heart is made of air,'

This is an enjoyable collection, offering insights into the natural world, memory, place and loneliness. 

Contemplation of Roses by Annest Gwilym, published (2026) by Lapwing Publications. (Buy it here).  

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Disclaimer: I was sent a free e-book of this title in exchange for an honest review.  

You can read my reviews of earlier books by Annest, by following the links below:

Seasons in the Sun.  

What the Owl Taught Me.  

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Meanwhile, I'm delighted to have a poem in the latest, Music themed, issue of Allegro magazine.