Yew Tree Quotes

All I want is blackness. Blackness and silence. (The actual Sylvia Plath quote from "The Moon and the Yew Tree" is: "And the message of the yew tree is blackness – blackness and silence.")

Cecily, what are you doing?" Will demanded, interrupting Gideon; he knew he sounded like a distracted parent, but he didn't care. Cecily has slid her blade into her belt and appeared to be trying to climb one of the small yew trees inside the first row of hedges. "Now is not the time for climbing trees!

I shall also take you forth and carve our names together in a yew tree, haloed with stars...

Even though it walked and talked, even though it was bigger than his house and could swallow him in one bite, the monster was still, at the end of the day, just a yew tree.

The moon is no door. It is a face in its own right, White as a knuckle and terribly upset. It drags the sea after it like a dark crime; it is quiet With the O-gape of complete despair. I live here. --from "The Moon and the Yew Tree", written 22 October 1961

Never did tombs look so ghastly white. Never did cypress, or yew, or juniper so seem the embodiment of funeral gloom. Never did tree or grass wave or rustle so ominously. Never did bough creak so mysteriously, and never did the far-away howling of dogs send such a woeful presage through the night.

I have fallen a long way. Clouds are flowering Blue and mystical over the face of the stars Inside the church, the saints will all be blue, Floating on their delicate feet over the cold pews, Their hands and faces stiff with holiness. The moon sees nothing of this. She is bald and wild. And the message of the yew tree is blackness - blackness and silence.

Far away beyond the pine-woods,' he answered, in a low dreamy voice, 'there is a little garden. There the grass grows long and deep, there are the great white stars of the hemlock flower, there the nightingale sings all night long. All night long he sings, and the cold, crystal moon looks down, and the yew-tree spreads out its giant arms over the sleepers.

Above rowan and yew, the elm tree stands tall. It waits along borders, a sentry at call.

Their hands and faces stiff with holiness. The moon sees nothing of this. She is bald and wild. And the message of the yew tree is blackness--blackness and silence.

I’ve always suspected that a sense of humour is a kind of parlour trick we civilized folk have taught ourselves as an insurance against disillusionment.

Ulysses found himself hopelessly adrift within the confines of a yew-hedge maze, the leaf tips of which were lit by a Communion-wafer moon that rested on the black tongue of night.

This is the time of tension between dying and birth The place of solitude where three dreams cross Between blue rocks But when the voices shaken from the yew-tree drift away Let the other yew be shaken and reply. Blessèd sister, holy mother, spirit of the fountain, spirit of the garden, Suffer us not to mock ourselves with falsehood Teach us to care and not to care Teach us to sit still Even among these rocks, Our peace in His will And even among these rocks Sister, mother And spirit of the river, spirit of the sea, Suffer me not to be separated And let my cry come unto Thee.

It is now or never," said the yew tree. "You must speak the truth.

Her dreams were otherworldly birds. They flew out of a stunted yew tree in the garden of her childhood and circled the roof of her house, cawing, years of their hoarse cries and black wings.

THE MOON AND THE YEW TREE This is the light of the mind, cold and planetary. The trees of the mind are black. The light is blue. The grasses unload their griefs on my feet as if I were God, Prickling my ankles and murmuring of their humility. Fumy, spiritous mists inhabit this place Separated from my house by a row of headstones. I simply cannot see where there is to get to. The moon is no door. It is a face in its own right, White as a knuckle and terribly upset. It drags the sea after it like a dark crime; it is quiet With the O-gape of complete despair. I live here. Twice on Sunday, the bells startle the sky Eight great tongues affirming the Resurrection. At the end, they soberly bong out their names. The yew tree points up. It has a Gothic shape. The eyes lift after it and find the moon. The moon is my mother. She is not sweet like Mary. Her blue garments unloose small bats and owls. How I would like to believe in tenderness The face of the effigy, gentled by candles, Bending, on me in particular, its mild eyes. I have fallen a long way. Clouds are flowering Blue and mystical over the face of the stars. Inside the church, the saints will be all blue, Floating on their delicate feet over the cold pews, Their hands and faces stiff with holiness. The moon sees nothing of this. She is bald and wild. And the message of the yew tree is blackness -- blackness and silence. --written 22 October 1961

The yew tree is the most important of all the healing trees, it said. It lives for thousands of years. Its berries, its bark, its leaves, its sap, its pulp, its wood, they all thrum and burn and twist with life. It can cure almost any ailment man suffers from, mixed and treated by the right apothecary.

Or, if he’s feeling more poetic, it might be “Now, Frobisher, the clarinet is the concubine, the violas are yew trees in the cemetery, the clavichord is the moon, so … let the east wind blow that A minor chord, sixteenth bar onwards.

It was getting dark by the time I went out, and nobody who knows the country will need to be told how black is the darkness of a November night under high laurel bushes and yew-trees. I walked into the heart of the shrubberies two or three times, not seeing a step before me, till I came out upon the broader carriage-road, where the trees opened a little, and there was a faint grey glimmer of sky visible, under which the great limes and elms stood darkling like ghosts; but it grew black again as I approached the corner where the ruins lay. ("The Open Door")

The forest rose about this open glade like an amphitheatre, in golden terraces of horsechestnut and beech. The big nuts dropped velvety and brown, as if they had been soaked in oil, and disappeared in the dry leaves below. Little black yew trees, that had not been visible in the green of summer, stood out among the curly yellow brakes. Through the grey netting of the beech twigs, stiff holly bushes glittered.

I took a stroll in the curious old-world garden which flanked the house. Rows of very ancient yew trees cut into strange designs girded it round. Inside was a beautiful stretch of lawn with an old sundial in the middle, the whole effect so soothing and restful that it was welcome to my somewhat jangled nerves.

Kandinski looked up. 'Do you read science fiction?' he asked matter-of-factly. 'Not as a rule,' Ward admitted. When Kandinski said nothing he went on: 'Perhaps I’m too skeptical, but I can’t take it too seriously.' Kandinski pulled at a blister on his palm. 'No one suggests you should. What you mean is that you take it too seriously.' Accepting the rebuke with a smile at himself, Ward pulled out one of the magazines and sat down at a table next to Kandinski. On the cover was a placid suburban setting of snugly eaved houses, yew trees, and children’s bicycles. Spreading slowly across the roof-tops was an enormous pulpy nightmare, blocking out the sun behind it and throwing a weird phosphorescent glow over the roofs and lawns. 'You’re probably right,' Ward said, showing the cover to Kandinski. 'I’d hate to want to take that seriously.' ("The Venus Hunters")

What we call the beginning is often the end And to make and end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from. And every phrase And sentence that is right (where every word is at home, Taking its place to support the others, The word neither diffident nor ostentatious, An easy commerce of the old and the new, The common word exact without vulgarity, The formal word precise but not pedantic, The complete consort dancing together) Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning, Every poem an epitaph. And any action Is a step to the block, to the fire, down the sea's throat Or to an illegible stone: and that is where we start. We die with the dying: See, they depart, and we go with them. We are born with the dead: See, they return, and bring us with them. The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree Are of equal duration. A people without history Is not redeemed from time, for history is a pattern Of timeless moments. So, while the light fails On a winter's afternoon, in a secluded chapel History is now and England.

The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree are of equal duration.

My name is Addie LaRue. I was born in Villon in the year 1691, my parents were Jean and Marthe, and we lived in a stone house just beyond an old yew tree . . .

I took up my place behind a yew tree and I saw his dark figure move until the intervening headstones and trees hid from sight.

The moon is my mother. She is not sweet like Mary. Her blue garments unloose small bats and owls. Sylvia Plath, Ariel; from ‘The Moon and the Yew Tree

For Hindus, banyan trees are sacred. For Buddhists, bodhi trees; for the Arabs, certain date palms. To be stalwart in a ‘tree-like’ way was to approach goodness, according to Confucius. The Normans built chapels in the trunks of yew trees. Many other cultures attached religious significance to particular trees and groves and forests. Adonis was born of a tree. Daphne turned into one. George Washington confessed to cutting one down and the United States, as a result, was all but immaculately conceived. The tree is the symbol of the male organ and of the female body. The Hebrew kabbalah depicts Creation in the form of a tree. In Genesis, a tree holds the key to immortal life, and it is to the branches and fruit of an olive tree that God’s people are likened in both the Old and New Testaments. To celebrate the birth of Christ his followers place trees in their sitting rooms and palm fronds, a symbol of victory, commemorate his entering Jerusalem. A child noted by Freud had fantasies of wounding a tree that represented his mother. The immortal swagman of Australia sat beneath a coolabah tree. In hundreds of Australian towns the war dead are honoured by avenues of trees.

Ancient oak, ash, and thorn, Out of these was magic born. Rowan, elder, apple too, Hazel, birch, and also yew. Tis the thorn tree folk most fear; You see her when a sprite is near Blossom sweet and berry sour, These will feed a witch's power.

nside the church, the saints will be all blue, Floating on their delicate feet over cold pews, Their hands and faces stiff with holiness. The moon sees nothing of this. She is bald and wild. And the message of the yew tree is blackness – blackness and silence.

A sprawling North London parkland, composed of oaks, willows and chestnuts, yews and sycamores, the beech and the birch; that encompasses the city’s highest point and spreads far beyond it; that is so well planted it feels unplanned; that is not the country but is no more a garden than Yellowstone; that has a shade of green for every possible felicitation of light; that paints itself in russets and ambers in autumn, canary-yellow in the splashy spring; with tickling bush grass to hide teenage lovers and joint smokers, broad oaks for brave men to kiss against, mown meadows for summer ball games, hills for kites, ponds for hippies, an icy lido for old men with strong constitutions, mean llamas for mean children and, for the tourists, a country house, its façade painted white enough for any Hollywood close-up, complete with a tea room, although anything you buy there should be eaten outside with the grass beneath your toes, sitting under the magnolia tree, letting the white blossoms, blush-pink at their tips, fall all around you. Hampstead Heath! Glory of London! Where Keats walked and Jarman fucked, where Orwell exercised his weakened lungs and Constable never failed to find something holy.

Trees for which there is no commercial value are referred to as "weeds" that interfere with commercial harvesting. That's what alders were called until a method to make high-grade paper from them was developed, but you'd never know that alders play an important ecological role. They are the first trees to grow after an opening is cleared in a forest, and they fix nitrogen from the air to fertilize the soil for the later-growing, longer-lived, bigger tree species. Yew trees have tough wood with gnarled branches and were called weeds and burned until a powerful anti-cancer agent was found in their bark.

I've been thinking about what it means to bear witness. The past ten years I've been bearing witness to death, bearing witness to women I love, and bearing witness to the [nuclear] testing going on in the Nevada desert. I've been bearing witness to bombing runs on the edge of the Cabeza Prieta Wildlife Refuge, bearing witness to the burning of yew trees and their healing secrets in slash piles in the Pacific Northwest and thinking this is not so unlike the burning of witches, who also held knowledge of heading within their bones. I've been bearing witness to traplines of coyotes being poisoned by the Animal Damage Control. And I've been bearing witness to beauty, beauty that strikes a chord so deep you can't stop the tears from flowing. At places as astonishing as Mono Lake, where I've stood knee-deep in salt-water to watch the fresh water of Lee Vining Creek flow over the top like water on vinegar....It's the space of angels. I've been bearing witness to dancing grouse on their leks up at Malheur in Oregon. Bearing witness to both the beauty and pain of our world is a task that I want to be part of. As a writer, this is my work. By bearing witness, the story that is told can provide a healing ground. Through the art of language, the art of story, alchemy can occur. And if we choose to turn our backs, we've walked away from what it means to be human.

Yes, isn't that was politics really boil down to in the end? What people will believe, what they will stand, what they can be induced to think? Never plain fact.

Najmanje što čoveku treba u predizbornoj kampanji jesu ljudi koji zaista misle svojom glavom.

But why worship a tree?' I said. 'I can think of many things less deserving of worship,' he replied. 'Look at how long some trees have been alive. Think of what they have seen. Why, there are yew trees in churchyards that may be more than a thousand years old; older still than the ancient church nearby. Their roots are in one millennium and their branches in another.

I have a great sense of Stuart and silence on these nights. The village, wrapped in sleep; owls glide between the yew trees, badgers poddle across the graves. Then Stuart, cleaving the peacefulness. All people, gone. No educational experts, medical specialists, bullies, policemen. His mother's disapproval, hot on his heels, runs out of breath after half a mile. It is Stuart and the earth, just those two.

Everyone has a full life, even if it ends soon. All lives are complete experiences. Do you know the T. S. Eliot quote?” “Which one?” “ ‘The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree are of equal duration.’ I know it’s not justification for murder, but I think it underscores how so many people think that all humans deserve a long life, when the truth is that any life at all is probably more than any of us deserves.

Light be the turf of thy tomb! May its verdure like emeralds be: There should not be the shadow of gloom In aught that reminds us of thee: Young flowers, and an evergreen tree May spring from the spot of thy rest; But not cypress nor yew let us see; For why should we mourn for the blest?

Never did the tombs look so ghastly white; never did cypress, or yew, or juniper so seem the embodiment of funeral gloom; never did tree or grass wave so ominously; never did bough creak so mysteriously; and never did the far-away howling of dogs send such a woeful presage through the night.

Rid of the world’s injustice, and his pain, He rests at last beneath God’s veil of blue: Taken from life when life and love were new The youngest of the martyrs here is lain, Fair as Sebastian, and as early slain. No cypress shades his grave, no funeral yew, But gentle violets weeping with the dew Weave on his bones an ever-blossoming chain. O proudest heart that broke for misery! O sweetest lips since those of Mitylene! O poet-painter of our English land! Thy name was writ in water — it shall stand: And tears like mine will keep thy memory green, As Isabella did her Basil tree. Rome

Suddenly a little wind stirred the trees: it shivered the fringed fingers of the yews where goldfinches were perching and pecking: then it smacked against the half-open window and the old loose frames muttered in their grooves. A current of air swept through the bedroom, cool from under a grey sky, almost cold. It was refreshing and smelt of freedom. If rocks were alive and breathed, they would exhale just that air, smelling of moss and running water. My bedside book seemed redundant suddenly; the morning's paper even more so. I banished the printed word, lay back and remembered . . .

-but deep down he knew that change was only the interval of death between two forms of life, destruction necessary to make room for fresher property. What though the board was up, and cosiness to let?--someone would come along and take it again some day. And only one thing really troubled him, sitting there--the melancholy craving in his heart--because the sun was like enchantment on his face and on the clouds and on the golden birch leaves, and the wind's rustle was so gentle, and the yew-tree green so dark, and the sickle of a moon pale in the sky. He might wish and wish and never get it--the beauty and the loving in the world!

Outside, I take in the fact that the night is deeply dusky and warm, and that feels like a balm after the cold air inside. I notice a strong smell from the glowing white roses that hang over the churchyard gate and the dark fluttering of bats that swarm from a high corner of the church tower. Around us, as we walk in the tired grass, gravestones whose cadaverous foundations have failed them lean against one another for support. I see a Celtic cross, the contours of lichen covered stone mounds, writing everywhere, words of remembrance, and, above us, the dark, pointed leaves of the yew tree greedily sucking away the last of the light.

And they began to talk—at first in their ordinary voices, but soon dropping into undertones because of the beauty, the immense, absorbed, hushed beauty of the night, with the moon, a day past its full, beginning to sail over the top of Burton Down behind them, and part the apple-leaves with silver fingers. And presently they didn't even talk, but Sat quite still, just as if for years they had been easy friends, and together they watched the great yew-tree on the other side of the little sleeping garden brushing its dark and solemn head across the stars, and listened to the cry of an owl, floating somewhere very far away towards them on the silence.

Sonnet XII: There is a Meetinghouse across the wold There is a Meetinghouse across the wold Near shaded churchyard where pine breezes sigh; Such sacred mem'ries gently here unfold Of rustic folk whom 'neath the yew trees lie. Engraved on stones now crum'ling in the earth, Of souls asleep for o'er a hundred years, Foretell unceasing cycles—Death and Birth That yew tree nods and weeps her unseen tears. But God shall guide us through the gloom of night Victorious over grim reaper's blade, As yet we grasp to see eternal light Amidst life's fickle joys which here do fade. Victims of Death by lusty scythe bannish'd Triumphant wake to find nightmares vanish'd! 13 February, 2013

Far away beyond the pine-woods," he answered, in a low, dreamy voice, "there is a little garden. There the grass grows long and deep, there are the great white stars of the hemlock flower, there the nightingale sings all night long. All night long he sings, and the cold crystal moon looks down, and the yew-tree spreads out its giant arms over the sleepers." Virginia's eyes grew dim with tears, and she hid her face in her hands. "You mean the Garden of Death," she whispered. "Yes, death. Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no to-morrow. To forget time, to forget life, to be at peace. You can help me. You can open for me the portals of death's house, for love is always with you, and love is stronger than death is.

Nothing can drive out the disease: not praying, not bathing them in holy water, not tying them to their beds, not leaping out from the night to frighten them, not holding them by the ankle in the cold river, not beating them around the head with a yew branch, not burying them crown to toe in warm manure, not hanging them upside down from a high tree and spinning them until they vomit, not drilling a tiny hole through their skulls to let the bad humors out of the brains.

not fade. They do not decay with time. They cannot be destroyed. The Shepherd King declared it so.” “And he, like you, is certainly a liar.” The wind whispered through branches. “Your time is up, Ravyn Yew,” the Spirit said. “I will have your answer now. Tell me—what is your name?” His throat tightened. His eyes rushed over the meadow, the tips of trees. Trees he and Jespyr and Emory had swung from as children. Just like Tilly did, waiting for her father. Breath bloomed out of Ravyn’s mouth in the cool air. So often was he fixed on going forward—always forward—that he hadn’t let himself look back. But the past had been shown to him. Written out for him. Laid bare at his feet. The branches carved into the Shepherd King’s crown—his hilt. The blade, swinging through the air, rearranging the wood. A name, whispered against a yew’s gnarled trunk. An old name. For an old, twisted tree. The Shepherd King’s face. His son Bennett’s gray eyes. The Scythe had not worked on Bennett. Just as it did not work on Ravyn. I’m nothing like you. But you are. More than you know. Ravyn met the Spirit of the Wood’s silver gaze. When he finally said the words, he knew, with every piece of himself, that they were true. “Taxus. My name is Taxus.

You?” Crowfeather decided he was still in some weird dream. “Like ‘Hey, you’?” “No, flea-brain,” the tabby tom responded, with an exasperated twitch of his whiskers. “Yew, like the tree.” “Oh, sorry,” Crowfeather mewed, then added after a moment, “I’m Crowfeather. Thanks for helping me.” “You’re welcome. I’ve learned a bit about patching up injured cats in my time, and I like to help out when I can.” Yew finished his massage and stood back, rubbing his paw in the snow to clean off the juices. “Try sitting up.” Crowfeather obeyed; his head swam, and every one of his muscles shrieked in protest, but he managed to stay upright. He found himself in the lee of a large, jutting outcrop of rocks, with only a thin powdering of snow covering the tough moorland grass. Beyond the shelter, all the hills were hidden in a thick layer of snow, the white expanse stretching in all directions as far as Crowfeather could see. More flakes were slowly drifting down. Though clouds hid the sun, he guessed that sunhigh would be long past. “How did you find me, in all this?” he asked. Yew looked thoughtful. “That was strange,” he replied. “I was hunting, down there on the edge of the forest. Then I saw a gray she-cat—the prettiest cat I ever laid eyes on. She beckoned me to follow her, and she brought me up here. But when we got here, I couldn’t find her . . . only you, half buried in the snow and looking just about dead.” For a moment his bold amber gaze softened. “Her fur glittered like stars. . . .” Feathertail! Warmth spread through Crowfeather from ears to tail-tip, as if he were basking in the sun of greenleaf. She saved me! Injured and unconscious in the snow, he would have frozen to death if no cat had found him.

Mr Casaubon’s behaviour about settlements was highly satisfactory to Mr Brooke, and the preliminaries of marriage rolled smoothly along, shortening the weeks of courtship. The betrothed bride must see her future home, and dictate any changes that she would like to have made there. A woman dictates before marriage in order that she may have an appetite for submission afterwards. And certainly, the mistakes that we male and female mortals make when we have our own way might fairly raise some wonder that we are so fond of it. On a grey but dry November morning Dorothea drove to Lowick in company with her uncle and Celia. Mr Casaubon’s home was the manor-house. Close by, visible from some parts of the garden, was the little church, with the old parsonage opposite. In the beginning of his career, Mr Casaubon had only held the living, but the death of his brother had put him in possession of the manor also. It had a small park, with a fine old oak here and there, and an avenue of limes towards the south-west front, with a sunk fence between park and pleasure-ground, so that from the drawing-room windows the glance swept uninterruptedly along a slope of greensward till the limes ended in a level of corn and pastures, which often seemed to melt into a lake under the setting sun. This was the happy side of the house, for the south and east looked rather melancholy even under the brightest morning. The grounds here were more confined, the flower-beds showed no very careful tendance, and large clumps of trees, chiefly of sombre yews, had risen high, not ten yards from the windows. The building, of greenish stone, was in the old English style, not ugly, but small-windowed and melancholy-looking: the sort of house that must have children, many flowers, open windows, and little vistas of bright things, to make it seem a joyous home. In this latter end of autumn, with a sparse remnant of yellow leaves falling slowly athwart the dark evergreens in a stillness without sunshine, the house too had an air of autumnal decline, and Mr Casaubon, when he presented himself, had no bloom that could be thrown into relief by that background. ‘Oh dear!’ Celia said to herself, ‘I am sure Freshitt Hall would have been pleasanter than this.’ She thought of the white freestone, the pillared portico, and the terrace full of flowers, Sir James smiling above them like a prince issuing from his enchantment in a rosebush, with a handkerchief swiftly metamorphosed from the most delicately-odorous petals—Sir James, who talked so agreeably, always about things which had common-sense in them, and not about learning! Celia had those light young feminine tastes which grave and weather-worn gentlemen sometimes prefer in a wife; but happily Mr Casaubon’s bias had been different, for he would have had no chance with Celia.

Elm. The Nightmare slowed his pace. When he looked back at Elm, his voice drifted in the air, oil and honey and poison. “Neither Rowan nor Yew, but somewhere between. A pale tree in winter, neither red, gold, nor green. Black hides the bloodstain, forever his mark. Alone in the castle, Prince of the dark.

They used to plant yew trees in graveyards”—Lola’s voice so close it made me jump—“because people believed they drank the poison left by the bodies.

She stood for a time, still and meditative, with her face held up to the arch of sky, seeking a shooting star in that illimitable field above her. The stars glittered and winked as if they were live, sentient beings, the angels themselves, watching the doings of earth, not in the serene manner of celestial beings but excited and interested in what they saw below. Their colours flashed in red and ice-blue and dazzling green and amber. There was Auriga with its bright Capella, a star Susan always recognised since her father long pointed out its bright flame. "That's the one I knows well. It's always been in the sky. I've watched it when I've been going to milking and coming home on winter nights, and it's been a kind of companion to me." The Great Bear swung over the house top, guarding Windystone from harm. Orion was hidden, but if she walked along by the yew trees, she could see his fiery stars and steel-green Riga, and the belt like a jewel. But she stayed where she was, alone, quiet, giving herself up to the movement of the rolling heavens, and she was caught up in that heavenly motion and whirled like a dark atom with the swinging earth.

I was still living on two planes. In this one, I could hear the whisper of his kilt where it brushed my shirt, feel the humid warmth of his body, warmer even than the heated air.....But on the plane of memory, I smelled yew trees and the wind from the sea, and under my fingers was no warm man, but the cold, smooth granite of a tombstone with his name

Odin remains at the core of staggering. His Óðr, the force that inspires people to perform or to prophesize; to produce scholarly works or to enter a frenzy in battle, is vital for travelling within the trees. Óðr overwhelms and infuses us, blankets our consciousness and brings us ecstasy: Odin, if you will, takes our hand and guides us through the greenways. “Here, on Midgard, Karl found first one, then many candidates for what he called heartwoods, the oldest of groves. Yew trees that were gnarled and twisted when Sumeria was young. Pines as old as the Pyramids. Old trees, like antenna, catching unworldly signals. Trees that resonated and thrummed with Óðr when sung to, songs from the beginning of days. Entities that took your embrace and danced you to somewhere entirely different, continents away—worlds away for those of us who are particularly adept. We have accepted this way of life as we have always embraced Yggdrasil: as a benefactor and a guardian. Those favoured by Odin ride his steed, those blessed by other gods still ride on wagons.

James Juniper is the wild sister, fearless as a fox and curious as a crow; she goes first into the tower. Inside she finds a ruin: snowdrifts of ash and char, the skeleton of the staircase still clinging to the walls, greasy soot blackening every stone. And three women... One of them is pale and fey, with ivory antlers sprouting from matted dark hair and yellowed teeth strung in a necklace around her throat. Her dress is ragged and torn, black as a moonless night. She meets Juniper's eyes and Juniper feels a thrill of recognition. Juniper always loved maiden-stories best. Maidens are supposed to be sweet, soft creatures who braid daisy-crowns and turn themselves into laurel trees rather than suffer the loss of their innocence, but the Maiden is none of those things. She's the fierce one, the feral one, the witch who lives free in the wild woods. She's the siren and the selkie, the virgin and the valkyrie; Artemis and Athena. She's the little girl in the red cloak who doesn't run from the wolf but walks arm in arm with him deeper into the woods. Juniper knows her by the savage green of her eyes, the vicious curve of her smile. An adder drapes over her shoulders like a strip of dark velvet, like the carved-yew snake of Juniper's staff come to life. Juniper's smile could be the Maiden's own, sharp and white, mirrored back across the centuries.

There are three great ages; the age of the yew tree, the age of the eagle, the age of the Cailleach.

But I understood how he saw the yew tree, what he thought of its scars… and perhaps of mine. He made them sound like a sign of strength rather than weakness.

The man between the Yew siblings was older, his tunic plain and his beard untrimmed. I stared at him, unable to place him. Then I noticed the small willow tree, woven in white thread, on the breast of his tunic. I leapt from my chair. “You brought a Physician?” I cried. “Why not just run me through with your dagger?” “Easy,” Ravyn said, his voice smooth. “We just want to ask you questions. He’s not going to report you. Isn’t that right, Filick?” “I am bound to obey the Captain,” the older man said. He gave Ravyn a faint wink, then approached the table with caution, as if I were a wild, fretful horse. Taking the chair to my right, he lowered himself to a seat. “My name is Filick Willow. What is yours?” I cast Ravyn a hateful glance. My whole life, I’d managed to avoid Physicians. This time, there was nowhere to hide.

What happened to your father?” Tilly did not answer. Ravyn tried again: “How did he die?” She looked away, her fingers dancing a silent rhythm on the yew branch. “I don’t know. They caught me first.” Her voice quieted. “I passed through the veil before my father and brothers.” It wasn’t the Mirror’s chill that was seeping into Ravyn. It was something else. A question that, in the dark corner of his mind, he already knew the answer to. “Who killed you?” Those yellow eyes flared. They landed on Ravyn. “You know his name.” Her voice went low, a deep, scraping whisper. “Rowan.” The King’s insignia flashed in Ravyn’s mind. His uncle’s flag—the unyielding rowan tree. Red Scythe Card, green eyes. Hunters, brutes. Family.

The Captain of the Destriers is dark and severe. Watching from yew trees, his gray eyes are clear. His wingspan is broad and his beak is quite sharp. Hide quick or he’ll find you… and rip out your heart. Dimia opened my door without knocking,

Captain of the Destriers is dark and severe. Perched atop yew trees, his gray eyes are clear. Be wary his magic, be wary his fate. The Yews and the Rowans do not ready friends make.

met your daughter. The one with braids in her hair and eyes like yours. Tilly.” The Nightmare’s shoulders tightened. He kept his eyes on the sword. “You’d be wise not to use the Mirror Card so recklessly, Ravyn Yew. To see beyond the veil is a perilous thing.” “She told me you’re seeking revenge for what the first Rowan King did to you.” A smile crept over his lips. Ravyn hated the sight of it. “Your daughter’s spirit has waited five hundred years in that tree for you. All your children wait.” When the Nightmare turned, his smile was gone. “I, too, have waited.” “To kill the Rowans?” “My aim is vast. There are many truths to unveil in the wood. Circles that began centuries ago will finally loop.” He let out a sigh. “Though I fear, with so many idiots around me, that I must do everything myself.” Ravyn’s tongue tripped over a flood of curses. He took a steadying breath. “What is your plan for when we return with the Twin Alders Card?

As for Elm, you won’t get your hands on him. He won’t be coming with us. What makes you think I’d hurt him? Ravyn scoffed. He’s a Rowan. Descendant of the man who stole your throne and killed your kin. You’ve had five hundred years to imagine your revenge. His stomach turned as he looked at the old blood beneath the Nightmare’s fingernails. Surely you want him dead. I had plenty of time to hurt him. Only I didn’t. The Princeling sensed me—saw my strange eyes—and recoiled. He understands, far better than you, Captain, that there are monsters in this world. He let out a long breath. My claws would find no purchase in a Rowan who is already broken. When Ravyn’s rigid jaw didn’t ease, the Nightmare grinned. Above rowan and yew, the elm tree stands tall. It waits along borders, a sentry at call. Quiet and guarded and windblown and marred, its bark whispers stories of a boy-Prince once scarred. His voice in Ravyn’s mind went eerily soft. And so, Ravyn Yew, your Elm I won’t touch. His life strays beyond my ravenous clutch. For a kicked pup grows teeth, and teeth sink to bone. I will need him, one day, when I harvest the throne.

Yew, the trees said together. The pale alder shifted closer to Ravyn. The yew tree is cunning, its shadow unknown. It bends without breaking, its secrets its own. Look past twisting branches, the dark alder called, dig deep to its bones. Is it the Twin Alders you seek—or is it the throne? The Nightmare’s hands were rigid, clawlike, at his sides. “Answer them,” he told Ravyn. Ravyn pulled in ragged breaths. “I seek the Twin Alders Card to unite the Deck.” To lift the mist, said the dark alder. To heal the infection, said the other. Ravyn nodded. Then you must ask the Spirit herself for

Jespyr came up from behind. “The Old Book of Alders,” she murmured, watching the Nightmare run his fingers over the yew trunk, “is about the barters the Shepherd King made for Providence Cards. But he was born with magic.” Her stance was rigid. “What was it?” The Nightmare closed his eyes and tapped his sword on the yew tree three times. Click, click, click. From his mouth, Ravyn distinguished a single word. “Taxus.” The answer to Jespyr’s question came ripping through the earth. The whole wood shook—quaking from deep beneath its soil. The ground rolled, knocking Ravyn and Jespyr into each other. They fell in a heap next to Petyr and Wik and Gorse, who stared up from the ground, wide-eyed. The forest was moving, yew trees rearranging themselves. Roots wrenched from the earth, clouding the air with dirt. Branches snapped and leaves whirled all around them, caught in the windstorm of shifting trees. The Nightmare centered himself in the tumult, crouched on his haunches, untouched by root or branch. He tapped his sword once more—this time on the ground—the sound distinct in the ripping din. Click, click, click. The yew trees stopped moving. At the Nightmare’s feet, beneath the litter of upturned soil and leaves and broken branches, was a path through the wood. Cold sweat pooled in Ravyn’s palms. He’d read The Old Book of Alders his entire life. But this was his first true glimpse at the man who’d written it. The Nightmare stood to full height. He looked over his shoulder at the party where they lay in the dirt. “What,” Jespyr called, incredulous, “is a Taxus?” “An old name, for an old, twisted tree.” When he caught Ravyn’s gaze lingering at his sword, he traced a pale finger over the hilt. “Surely you didn’t think it was sheep I shepherded.

There are many circles that draw through time,” he said. “Many mirrored events, many woods that inevitably lead us to the same place. Much of what happened five hundred years ago has happened again.” His eyes narrowed. “But not this. You will not make a monster out of him as you did me, forcing him to give up a sister. Let go of Jespyr Yew. Or I will cleave your roots from this earth.” The alders went rigid, their slithering roots and twisting branches halting to an eerie stillness. Then, so abruptly I’d no time to scream, they seized Ravyn, ripping him away from Jespyr. He shouted, thrashed, but was tossed with abandon through the doorway onto the pale shore. The trees turned their vicious branches on the Nightmare. But his sword found them first. He took to the roots, cutting Jespyr free with furious precision. The hill trembled, the opening between the alders as narrow as my bedroom door at Spindle House. Keep going, I urged him. He pried Jespyr’s limp body off the earth and slung her over his shoulders. The two of them were struck over and over by flailing branches. Ravyn reached out, the space between the alders now so narrow he could not get back out. “Take my hand!” The Nightmare took it. When Ravyn yanked him forward, the doorway between the twin alders slammed shut. The trees and the hilltop were gone. All that remained now was a pale shore, accompanied by the sound of waves. And the oppressive smell of salt.

The Nightmare paused, looming over Ravyn like a shadow. Slowly, he knelt. “Look at me.” Ravyn’s gaze seemed far and near. It crashed into my window. “A King’s reign is wrought with burden. Weighty decisions ripple through centuries. Still, decisions must be made.” The Nightmare’s whisper was like wind in the trees. “You are strong, Ravyn Yew. I have known that since the moment I clapped eyes on you. And you must keep being strong—” He turned and faced the hilltop. “For what comes next.” The hill’s crown

My eyes jutted open. When I looked to my side, a girl sat next to me in the sand. A child. Her hair was woven in two perfect plaits, as if a woman who loved her had taken time to braid them with care. But more than her hair, more than the tilting of her head, it was her eyes I noticed. Her brilliant, yellow eyes. “Who are you?” A grin cracked over her little mouth. “You know who I am. I’m your Tilly.” My name unraveled itself from my mouth like a long piece of string. “I’m Elspeth Spindle.” She giggled, and the sound carried up and down the beach. “Can we swing in the yew tree like you promised?

Bennett. He looked like Emory—like Ravyn. Blunder families have always taken the names of the trees, I whispered. But I have never heard of a tree called Taxus. That’s because it is an old name, came his oily reply. For an old, twisted tree. Like the last line of a poem, the truth fell into place. A yew tree. Ravyn searched the Nightmare’s eyes. “Does Elspeth know?” “Only just.” “Why didn’t you tell us?” “Would you have believed me, monster and liar that I am?” Ravyn’s pause was answer enough. “The Spirit showed me your death.” He heaved a sigh. “I can guess what it is you want from me, Taxus. But I am not the dark bird of your revenge. I will not be another Captain who steals the throne. I will unite the Deck—but I will never be King of Blunder.” I watched Ravyn, weighing words that he—a man who uttered so few—had offered. “Our walk in the wood,” the Nightmare replied, “was about more than the Twin Alders Card, Ravyn Yew. There were five hundred years of truth to unravel. And now that you and Elspeth know it—” His sharp laugh echoed over the water. “You still do not understand. My revenge is not merely a sword. It is a scale. It is balance. I will take the throne of Blunder back. But not for you.” He straightened his spine, fixing Ravyn in his unflinching gaze. “For Elm.

As I suspected,” the Nightmare said, indifferent. “Decidedly broken.” Ravyn jerked his head back. “You’re hardly a Physician.” “No. But I’ve mended my share of noses—my own in particular.” “I hope whoever broke it enjoyed the feeling.” “I’m sure he did.” His voice caught in the mist. “He had an exacting hand, Brutus Rowan, when it came to pain.” They all went still. Slowly, Jespyr leaned forward. “Did you know him well? The first Rowan King?” “Piss on that,” Petyr said. “Tell us what everyone’s spent five hundred years guessing. Was he the one who killed you?” The Nightmare didn’t answer. His mouth was a tight line, and his eyes were on the trees. He had that faraway look he got when he was talking to Elspeth. Ravyn rolled his jaw. “Well?” Yellow eyes snapped onto him. “Yes. I knew him well.” He leaned over Ravyn. “This is going to hurt. You may wish to distract yourself.” “How do you propose I do that?” “Reach into your pocket.” Ravyn’s brow knit, and the Nightmare blew out a breath. “Not stupid indeed,” he muttered. “The Nightmare Card, Ravyn Yew. That’s as good an invitation to enter my mind as you’ll ever get.

Neither Rowan nor Yew, but somewhere between. A pale tree in winter, neither red, gold, nor green. Black hides the bloodstain, forever his mark. Alone in the castle, Prince of the dark.

The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree are of equal duration.’ I know it’s not justification for murder, but I think it underscores how so many people think that all humans deserve a long life, when the truth is that any life at all is probably more than any of us deserves.

Pines and spruces can't be sheared like yew or hemlock, but they are stately in large landscapes, where their eventual size is a plus. (But they are a nightmare in small yards, where their eventual size is like having a brontosaurus nesting in the front yard.)

My claws would find no purchase in a Rowan who is already broken. When Ravyn’s rigid jaw didn’t ease, the Nightmare grinned. Above rowan and yew, the elm tree stands tall. It waits along borders, a sentry at call. Quiet and guarded and windblown and marred, its bark whispers stories of a boy-Prince once scarred. His voice in Ravyn’s mind went eerily soft. And so, Ravyn Yew, your Elm I won’t touch. His life strays beyond my ravenous clutch. For a kicked pup grows teeth, and teeth sink to bone. I will need him, one day, when I harvest the throne.

Your home, too, isn’t it?” “Duty requires I remain here, with the King,” he said, his expression unwavering. “But it is not my home. My family’s estate is in town. The Destriers often train there, as they once did at Spindle House.” I frowned. “The castle at the top of the hill?” “The very same.” Castle Yew was old—the grounds historic. The wrought-iron gate and the dark, climbing ivy resided under the shadow of ancient yew trees—tall and foreboding. Beyond lay a statuary, a maze of stone and hedges, then the towering, ominous house. I had walked past the gate many times as a child, certain to my bones there was something to fear under those trees. I’d never been inside.

Tell me what’s going on,” I said. “I’ll not risk being branded a traitor as well as a magic carrier.” The Captain put his elbow on the table and rested his chin against the heel of his palm. He spoke through his fingers, his voice a muffled growl. “I’ll tell you what you need to know. But I can’t do it alone. We keep a council.” Be wary, the Nightmare said, stringing his words like spider silk in my ears. The yew tree is cunning, its shadow unknown. It bends without breaking, its secrets its own. Look past twisting branches, dig deep to its bones. Is it Providence Cards he seeks—or is it the throne? I turned to Ravyn, emboldened. “You must tell me everything.” He raised a brow, glaring down his long nose at me. “There are things I have to do—” “You want my magic?” I said, cutting off the Captain of the Destriers. “Call your council. I want the truth. Now.

.... but things are very twisted round nowadays, Norreys. Farmers and solid working-class men are the staunch Conservatives and young men with intellects and degrees and lots of money are Labour, mainly, I suppose, because they don't know the first thing about really working with their hands and haven't an idea what a working man really wants.

By the pond, an old yew tree had grown against a millstone, like a finger swelling round a wedding ring.

Teresa went on, 'You will insist on making your own design for life, Hugh, and trying to fit other people into it. But they've got their own design. Everyone has got their own design—that's what makes life so confusing. Because the designs are interlaced—superimposed. 'Just a few people are born clear-eyed enough to know their own design. I think Isabella was one of them… She was difficult to understand—for us to understand—not because she was complex but because she was simple—almost terrifyingly simple. She recognized nothing but essentials.

You can't win when you're fighting someone who doesn't know there is a fight.

She gave me the impression of one who has been afraid—but has not dared to show fear—and who knows the occasion for fear is now over.

Beorc is the root of the Modern English word ‘birch’, but it’s usually thought that the tree described here is actually a poplar.8 What’s notable about this verse is its emphasis on the tree’s beauty, which distinguishes it from the other trees included in the Rune Poem. In their respective verses, the oak, ash and yew are all characterized by their important functions in human society: the ash provides wood for weapons, the oak timber for ships and the yew firewood, a ‘joy in the home’.

The rear doors of the Marble Hall open onto the sprawling Fountain Terrace, decorated with statues and topiary. A promenade curves southward from it, lined with yew trees that resemble giant gumdrops, and banks of daffodils and bluebells. Multiple gated gardens snake outward from the grassy lane. "This is the first of the gardens that we allow visitors to tour," Max says, leading me through a gate with a plaque above it reading THE FRENCH GARDEN. "We just planted new pink roses for the summer season." "They're beautiful." I can feel Max watching me intently as I wander the perimeter, taking in the blooming flowers and lush orange trees.

The Nightmare’s whisper was like wind in the trees. “You are strong, Ravyn Yew. I have known that since the moment I clapped eyes on you. And you must keep being strong—” He turned and faced the hilltop. “For what comes next.

She passed under the ivy-grown lych-gate and walked between the yew trees. The graves were clustered together in groups, as if they had secrets to share and were turning over-the-shoulder eyes on incomers. The newly mown grass was cadmium green oil paint squeezed straight from the tube. Stella leaned on the railings as she read the inscriptions on William and Dorothy's graves. The light made the lettering crisp and brought out the purples and golds of the lichens. Shadows bowed the head of the lamb on Dora Quillinan's gravestone; the trees beyond were full of the trilling of blackbirds, and lines of Wordsworth's "Lucy" poem came into Stella's mind. "No motion has she now, no force, she neither hears nor sees," she whispered. "Rolled round in earth's diurnal course, with rocks, and stones, and trees."

You don't make memories, you either remember or you forget

Children's games were not imitations of adult reality. Children adapted props, dressing up clothes and toys as signs and signifiers to construct a situation they could control, a reality without coercions or sanctions

Her mum said there was no crisis so large that you forgot your manners

Grief could be caustic. War had brought people together and it had driven them far apart

Rules offer opportunities not restrictions

I knew he had a hold on her, I wasn't clear what it was, she said it was better that I didn't know. But what you don't know, you make up

It's easier to cry for our own dead at other funerals. Many will be in fear that it will soon be their loved one they mourn

You're only harmless when you're dead

Sweeny the thin-groined it is in the middle of the yew; life is very bare here, piteous Christ it is cheerless. Grey branches have hurt me they have pierced my calves, I hang here in the yew-tree above, without chessmen, no womantryst. I can put no faith in humans in the place they are; watercress at evening is my lot, I will not come down.

It’s like walking into a dark fairy tale. The building looked pristine from the outside, but inside it’s been left tumbledown and artfully neglected. The plaster is half torn from the walls, exposing red brick; the ceiling is open to the floor above, its edges jagged, showing the broken ends of the beams that once held the second story in place. A fireplace is decorated in heavy wreathes of ivy and yew, and there are trees positioned around the space as if they’ve always been there, growing in the wreckage.

David went on through the dark churchyard, over the wooden bridge where the beck chuckled unseen beneath him and an owl hooted loud above him somewhere in the starry darkness beyond the black yew-trees. The moon had not yet risen above the horizon of the high moors. But already, like a herald of its coming, the stark shapes of the Black Rocks were sharply outlined: black cut-outs against a sky clear as a blue diamond.

Sa, Norreys, non sono mai riuscito a credere in Dio. Dio Padre, che ha generato le creature e i fiori, Dio che ci ama e si prende cura di noi, Dio che ha creato il mondo. No, non credo in Dio. Ma, a volte, non posso farci nulla, credo in Cristo... perché Cristo è sceso all'inferno... Il suo amore è stato profondo fino a questo punto... Ha promesso il paradiso ai penitenti. E agli altri? A chi bestemmiava e lo insultava? Cristo è andato all'inferno con loro. Forse dopo... ".

Tu ti attieni al Tempo. Ma il Tempo non vuol dire assolutamente niente. Cinque minuti e mille anni hanno lo stesso significato. E poi citò piano:" Il momento della rosa e il momento del tasso hanno uguale durata... ".