When there is perfume even in poetry

Dylan Thomas - In The Beginning

In the beginning was the three-pointed star,
One smile of light across the empty face,
One bough of bone across the rooting air,
The substance forked that marrowed the first sun,
And, burning ciphers on the round of space,
Heaven and hell mixed as they spun.

In the beginning was the pale signature,
Three-syllabled and starry as the smile,
And after came the imprints on the water,
Stamp of the minted face upon the moon;
The blood that touched the crosstree and the grail
Touched the first cloud and left a sign.

In the beginning was the mounting fire
That set alight the weathers from a spark,
A three-eyed, red-eyed spark, blunt as a flower,
Life rose and spouted from the rolling seas,
Burst in the roots, pumped from the earth and rock
The secret oils that drive the grass.

In the beginning was the word, the word
That from the solid bases of the light
Abstracted all the letters of the void;
And from the cloudy bases of the breath
The word flowed up, translating to the heart
First characters of birth and death.

In the beginning was the secret brain.
The brain was celled and soldered in the thought
Before the pitch was forking to a sun;
Before the veins were shaking in their sieve,
Blood shot and scattered to the winds of light
The ribbed original of love.

Something my husband wrote...

Distilation Procedure


The Novice Alchemist's Table-Top Distillation Guide

By Sean Loewen

Article 1: An Introduction.

This is the first in a series of articles describing the process of distillation for the hobbyist or aspiring desktop distiller.

Distillation can be fun and rewarding but one must keep in mind that it can be dangerous and possibly illegal in your area. Take the necessary safety precautions such as fire-proofing (a stable setup and a well-ventilated area) and fire-fighting equipment (baking soda works well), expect the unexpected, and check with local law enforcement about the legalities where you are. Also life insurance is a good idea. I am not encouraging anyone to do anything dangerous or illegal, rather I want to highlight these areas so that that no one causes injury or insult to themselves or others. BEWARE! Alcohol is extremely flammable and can be explosive as a vapour. I cannot caution anyone enough about this. You could blow yourself up, in which case you won't be able to post on this forum. So be careful.

OK with that aside, this article is just an introduction really. I'm going to explain what distillation is, outline what the other articles are going to cover, and then I'm going to give you a sneak peak on the next step. Confused? Me too. It's probably the alcohol vapors.

What is distillation? You obviously already have some idea of what it means. Perhaps you even know how it works and what happens on both sides of the equation. Well for everyone else's sake I'm going to give a brief description, because I think this is what makes an introduction, isn't it?

Distillation is the process of using the varying boiling points of two or more liquids to seperate your mixture (such as wine) into the different liquid compounds (e.g. alcohol and rancid grape juice) that it is made from, in as pure a form as possible. (Although why anyone would want pure rancid grape juice is beyond me.)

Sounds simple, right? OK, maybe not to everyone. But basically you're heating a mixture or solution to a temperature high enough that one part of your mixture (in our case, alcohol) evaporates quickly and leaves the boiling container, passes up a column and through some cooling tubes to recondense into another container, while the water and other things drip back down into the boiling container, thereby seperating the alcohol from everything else.

I hope you are all with me so far. If so, read on. If not, reread the above and if you have any questions please post them, I will answer. There are no stupid questions, only stupid TV License Inspectors. (Yes, in Ireland you have to have a license to own a TV. No, I'm not joking.)
Read more

Opened up Nexus The Forum

You know something, I realised a while back that 'Nexus Forum is a brilliant resource, so... I have opened it up to the public - for viewing only. It's all here now, all the posts, discussions, topics, questions and fun. Read away as a guest. Then when you want to, you can register and join in.

Stuff about Perfumery, lots of great discussions and information shared. There are loads of different topics like Natural Beauty, Green Living, Food and more.

Enjoy...the New...The OPEN NN Forum.

Scarlet Pimpernel

Scarlet Pimpernel

Vermilion petals
five
bright stars
beneath my feet.
My mother told me
her name
and I loved her.
RR