THE DOOR

Too little
Has been said
Of the door, its one
Face turned to the night’s
Downpour and its other
To the shift and glisten of firelight

Air, clasped
By this cover
Into the room’s book,
Is filled by the turning
Pages of dark and fire
As the wind shoulders the panels, or unsteadies that burning

Not only
The storm’s
Breakwater, but the sudden
Frontier to our concurrences, appearances,
And as full of the offer of space
As the view through a cromlech is

For doors
are both frame and monument
to our spent time,
and too little
has been said
of our coming through and leaving by them

(Charles Tomlinson)

The Cloister

A cloister (from Latin claustrum) is a part of cathedral, monastic and abbey architecture. A cloister consists usually of four corridors, with a courtyard or garth in the middle. It is intended to be both covered from the rain, but open to the air. The attachment of a cloister to a Cathedral church usually indicates that it is (or was once) a monastic foundation.

Cloistered (or "Claustral") life is also another name for the life of a monk or nun in the enclosed religious orders; the modern English term enclosure is used in contemporary Catholic church law to mean cloistered, and cloister is sometimes used as a synonym for monastery.

In medieval times, cloisters served the primary function of quiet meditation or study gardens.

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Picture of Cloister of Glasgow University

Eilean Donan Castle

The name Eilean Donan, or island of Donan, is most probably called after the 6th century Irish Saint, Bishop Donan who came to Scotland around 580 AD. The first fortified structure was not built on the island until the early 13th century as a defensive measure, protecting the lands of Kintail against the Vikings who raided, settled and controlled much of the North of Scotland and the Western Isles between 800 and 1266. From the mid 13th century, this area was the quite seperate "Sea Kingdom" of the Lord of the Isles where the sea was the main highway and the power of feuding clan chiefs was counted by the number of men and galleys or "birlinns" at their disposal. Eilean Donan offered the perfect defensive position. Over the centuries, the castle itself has expanded and contracted in size.

For the best part of 200 years, the stark ruins of Eilean Donan lay neglected, abandoned and open to the elements, until Lt Colonel John Macrae-Gilstrap bought the island in 1911. Along with his Clerk of Works, Farquar Macrae, he dedicated the next 20 years of his life to the reconstruction of Eilean Donan, restoring her to her former glory. The castle was rebuilt according to the surviving ground plan of earlier phases and was formally completed in the July of 1932.

Picture of Eilean Donan Castle, Scotland, on the road to Isle of Skye

TO A DEAD MAN
By : Carl Sandburg


OVER the dead line we have called to you
To come across with a word to us,
Some beaten whisper of what happens
Where you are over the dead line
Deaf to our calls and voiceless.

The flickering shadows have not answered
Nor your lips sent a signal
Whether love talks and roses grow
And the sun breaks at morning
Splattering the sea with crimson.