The COP26 pilgrimage set out from Dunbar on Monday 18th October, bound for Glasgow. After an overnight in North Berwick, everyone congregated on the beach to listen to the waves and a few lines from Jon O'Donohue's poem "The Inner story of the Day":
No one knew the name of this day;
Born quietly from deepest night,
It hid its face in light,
Demanded nothing for itself,
Opened out to offer each of us
A field of brightness that travelled ahead,
Providing in time, ground to hold our footsteps
And the light of thought to show the way.
The mind of the day draws no attention;
It dwells within the silence with elegance
To create a space for all our words,
Drawing us to listen inward and outward.
We then set off along the coast, following the shoreline listening inwardly and outwardly to the anguish of the earth and to our own sorrows at her distress.
Pilgrims on the Beach - COP26 Nature Pilgrimage, photo Glen Cousquer
As we headed up the Forth and learnt more about this wonderful Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) we also heard a lament in the air for we had a talented fiddler with us, in Cammy Newell.
Fiddler on the Beach, Cammy Newell - COP26 Nature Pilgrimage. Photo Glen Cousquer
That evening we camped on the edges of the Aberlady Local Nature Reserve and watched as wave after wave of pink footed geese passed overhead on their way to roost in the bay. Thousands of geese flew in formation their haunting voices adding to the lament for they too know of the earth’s perilous state. They spoke in sounds we could barely understand but we knew that they were fellow pilgrims whose hopes for COP26 were not dissimilar to our own.
The earth holds our footsteps even as the tide patiently wipes them clean. Sadly, our footsteps lay increasingly heavy on the earth and we can no longer rely on the time and the tide to wipe them clean.
Time and tide wait for no man as they say … especially when man is leadenfooted.
Pilgrims on the Beach - COP26 Nature Pilgrimage. Photo Glen Cousquer.
Listen to the podcast with Glen here and find out more about his background and the concepts behind the “pilgrimage”.