Who done it, you mean? Better ask Ms Marple.

Ant, you're a marvel.

Aw, you two have made me go a bit gooey.
 


But all good things must end. Back to churches and stuff?

Not to mention mottled.

Church Going
     
Once I am sure there's nothing going on
I step inside, letting the door thud shut.
Another church: matting, seats, and stone,
And little books; sprawlings of flowers, cut
For Sunday, brownish now; some brass and stuff
Up at the holy end; the small neat organ;
And a tense, musty, unignorable silence,
Brewed God knows how long. Hatless, I take off
My cycle-clips in awkward reverence,

Move forward, run my hand around the font.
From where I stand, the roof looks almost new-
Cleaned or restored? Someone would know: I don't.
Mounting the lectern, I peruse a few
Hectoring large-scale verses, and pronounce
"Here endeth" much more loudly than I'd meant.
The echoes snigger briefly. Back at the door
I sign the book, donate an Irish sixpence,
Reflect the place was not worth stopping for.

Yet stop I did: in fact I often do,
And always end much at a loss like this,
Wondering what to look for; wondering, too,
When churches fall completely out of use
What we shall turn them into, if we shall keep
A few cathedrals chronically on show,
Their parchment, plate, and pyx in locked cases,
And let the rest rent-free to rain and sheep.
Shall we avoid them as unlucky places?

Or, after dark, will dubious women come
To make their children touch a particular stone;
Pick simples for a cancer; or on some
Advised night see walking a dead one?
Power of some sort or other will go on
In games, in riddles, seemingly at random;
But superstition, like belief, must die,
And what remains when disbelief has gone?
Grass, weedy pavement, brambles, buttress, sky,

A shape less recognizable each week,
A purpose more obscure. I wonder who
Will be the last, the very last, to seek
This place for what it was; one of the crew
That tap and jot and know what rood-lofts were?
Some ruin-bibber, randy for antique,
Or Christmas-addict, counting on a whiff
Of gown-and-bands and organ-pipes and myrrh?
Or will he be my representative,

Bored, uninformed, knowing the ghostly silt
Dispersed, yet tending to this cross of ground
Through suburb scrub because it held unspilt
So long and equably what since is found
Only in separation - marriage, and birth,
And death, and thoughts of these - for whom was built
This special shell? For, though I've no idea
What this accoutred frowsty barn is worth,
It pleases me to stand in silence here;

A serious house on serious earth it is,
In whose blent air all our compulsions meet,
Are recognised, and robed as destinies.
And that much never can be obsolete,
Since someone will forever be surprising
A hunger in himself to be more serious,
And gravitating with it to this ground,
Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in,
If only that so many dead lie round.

Philip Larkin

Well normally I'd post it elsewhere (the Poetry Appreciation thread) but it seemed so apt...

I do like that Philip Larkin poem.

Time for another remote little Welsh Church, St. Ellwy at Llanelieu, in Powys, 13th century with remains of 14th century rood screen and loft, painted timber screen, and traces of medieval wall paintings. The West wall has 7th-9th century pillar stones marked with crosses.  Dedicated to St. Ellwy, daughter or grand-daughter of King Brychan or possibly St. Elli, a 6th century Saint who studied with St. Cadoc and became Abbot of Llancarfan.  In the Saints book Ellwy is mentioned as a Martyr and virgin but I know no more about her.  (I've changed th pic of the Church to show the sheep that graze the churchyard.

Just to fill the space the last picture is another Church dedicated to St. Ellwy at Llanelly, also in Powys.  It's a 12th century Church with mid 17th century  additions, and as Don Basilio is interested in barrel ceilings this is the South Aisle built in 1626.


       


         

         

Oh I am sorry Don Basilio, I read that as St. Stephen of the Buglars intially which reduced me to laughter    Very striking. 

I must find my photos of Istanbul.

I think my last posting was the final rood and loft in Wales that I know of.  Much as we may curse the improving Victorians for ripping out mediaevel features we haven't been much better have we?