6 September 2026

Helen Lawrenson sent me a postcard from her holiday cottage. On it, she had written a poem. It was called, ‘Washing Day’. It came on the back of a postcard of miners’ lamps taken from the ‘Lamp Cabin’ at the Beamish Museum. This is her poem:

It was a good drying day

and in my arms I held

the basket (a blue

shirt cuff hanging down

over the field)

when I met the deep eyes

of the hind a few feet away.

We stood making no sound

a long moment or two –

she in her coat of foxy brown,

I in my red and grey.

Then as if processing surprise

she turned her head to bound

over the fence, while I

watching the long grasses sway

hung the shirts up to dry.

The poet captures the moment beautifully. It is an experience of awe. You don’t have to be in a holy building to experience awe. It’s a gift which is given to all those who look attentively at the natural world and savour the moment. It all happened on an ordinary day when washing was being hung out to dry!