Completing the Sheffield section of the river

Mike and I walked the other half of the Sheffield section of the river – from The Wicker to Meadowhall.

There is a fully made up path all the way – and most of it has metal arches overhead.

We saw plenty of wildlife, flora and fauna – a flock of white geese at Brightside, a kingfisher, a tree full of apples, elderberries, wild honeysuckle to name just some of them.

The river changes speed and mood. At times it was low and almost asleep, and at others deep and fast flowing.

Since the walk, I’ve visited Yorkshire Sculpture Park. While there an exhibition of mesostic poems by Alec Finlay – poems written in the shape of plants whose form reflects the subject matter – has inspired to have a go at my own.

Spice

As Carolyn has said, we spent a very inspiring two days taking part in the Sheffield Spice event.

Here’s Carolyn reading her poem on the banks of the Don in Neepsend, just upstream from Kelham Island, which is visible in the background.

I didn’t have a suitable image ready at the time, and used one of Wardsend, Owlerton, for our postcard. The image here, however, is my first monoprint of Kelham Island.

SPICE – Stimulating Participation in the Informal Creative Economy conference

The first public airing of one of the River Don poems took place at the SPICE conference, Sheffield, this week.

I led delegates on a river walk from the Work Station to Neepsend, via Castle Market, Lady’s Bridge and Kelham Island. At Neepsend I read Song of the Nepr, since the place name is thought to come from the word Nepr.

Mike had produced a postcard with the poem on one side and one of his monoprints on the other.

There seemed to be a lot of interest in the project, and we gathered ideas from some of the delegates working on similar things elsewhere in the country (such as Strandlines in London). I personally found the conference inspiring and motivational.

(CW)

First poem

Very excited. I’ve drafted my first poem for the project – on the source of The Don. Will be giving it an airing at The Word Train reading tonight as part of Sheffield Poetry Festival (we’re reading fresh work and this is very fresh – straight from my notebook this morning!)

(CW)

Don Walk – Middlewood to Neepsend

We completed our walk of the stretch of the Don from Middlewood to Neepsend last Friday (Feb 11).

After taking the tram to its terminus at Middlewood, we crossed the footbridge opposite Beeley Woods and followed the path from there along the back of industrial units and factories.

The day started with rain but became warmer and warmer, with bright, sunny intervals. Catkins were out and buds were forming on other trees. We heard many birds, and saw dippers, bluetits and great tits.

The Don turns a bend at Middlewood and is very deep as the river cuts into the earth. There is a warning notice on the bridge.  We noticed that the bank supporting the Penistone Road above had been shored up after the 2007 floods (there were roadworks on that stretch for well over a year).

Beeley Woods are a hidden treasure – a beautiful patch of deciduous woodland, possibly ancient. I’m going to carry out some research on their history.

Behind the Trebor Bassett factory where the smell of sugar and licorice was heavy in the air, Mike spotted one of the famed wild mink running along the bank opposite us.

The redbrick factory is built right up to the river’s edge. At first we thought the animal was a cat – it was around the same size – but it was low to the ground and undulated as it ran, chasing a bird. I was shocked at how large the mink was, and could see the gloss of its chestnut fur even from four metres or so away.

Wardsend Cemetery had very recently been cleared so the paths between the gravestones were easy to follow. We had a quick look for the graves of Cherokees who allegedly came to Sheffield as part of a Wild West act. Again, I intend to carry out more research on this and the cemetery as a whole.

There was an obelisk dedicated to Sheffield soldiers who werenamed – not from any particular battles.

We struck a problem here in that the track we wanted to follow – Club Mill Road – was knee deep in mud which meant we had to make for the Penistone Road, turning back to the river after the Farfield pub.

From that point we were able to follow it all the way to Neepsend through the luxury city living apartments in renovated warehouses and factories.

From this direction, standing on the bridge over the weir, Kelham island could be clearly seen. We had to come away from the river and weave in and out of the industrial buildings at Neepsend, making our way to the Fat Cat pub, where the water marks of Sheffield’s two great floods are recorded.

The name Neepsend has mythological origins, neep or nepr meaning ‘water goblin’.

(CW)

Bibiliography and Research

I’ve completed my initial background reading for the project, identifying possible historical and mythological references which could be introduced into the poetry, or used as a basis for it. The Don is rich with myth, legend and anecdote; place names are often derived from Celtic or Norse gods.

Bibliography

G.Ashe, Mythology of the British Isles, (Methuen, London, 1990)

D.Hey, Historic Hallamshire, (Landmark, Ashbourne, 2001)

D.Clarke, A Guide To Britain’s Pagan Heritage, (Hale, 1995)

Mr. and Mrs. P.Dreadful, Haunted Sheffield, (Tempus, 2006)

A.Roberts, Ghosts and Legends of Yorkshire, (Jarrold, 1992)

D.Clarke & R. Wilson, Strange Sheffield (1987)

D.Clarke, Strange South Yorkshire, (Sigma, 1994)

J.Edward Vickers, Tales and Legends of Ancient Sheffield, (JEV Publications, 1973)

M. Jones, The Making of the South Yorkshire Landscape, (Wharncliffe Books,  Barnsley, 2000)

My next step is to walk the Sheffield stretch of the Don for the pilot stage of the project. I intend to do this in two stages – the Upper Don from Beeley Woods to Kelham Island, and then from Kelham Island to Meadowhall, weather and health permitting.

(CW)

Source of the Don

I visited the upper Don (above Dunford Bridge) on Sunday, 24 October. Unlike Joanna Lumley in her search for the source of the Nile, I was unable to pinpoint any place where it began. In reality, the moor is like a giant sponge – or the alveoli in a lung – and it’s impossible to say where the source of the river is. Up there, under the sky and with low cloud passing just overhead, there’s a greater sense of the river as a process.

However, for the sake of making images, I’ve taken an arbitrary start: one of many, I suspect. (MH)

Don: 1558'; N53 degrees, 31.271; W001 degrees, 49.324'