Dear Kelly and Iain,

Mostly I have been spending time in the studio working on my ceramic figurines. This is a great pleasure for me as the project slowly inches towards completion.

I have also just finished a recording called Seven Psalms. It is spoken word, essentially, set to very beautiful music, if I may say so myself. Each psalm is made up of three four-line verses and addresses a different spiritual concern — joy, guilt, evil, adulation etc. The seven are recorded as one long piece. Not for everyone, to be sure, but a lovely thing all the same. I’m not sure what I will do with it, or when it will be released, but, Iain, here is Psalm Six.

Such Things Should Never Happen

Such things should never happen but we die

The swallow finds an oak to nest her young

Defenceless between the earth and the sky

Uncounted beneath a vast, indifferent sun

A mother holds her baby to her breast

She trusts in you yet does not dare to breathe

As the baby swallow falls from its nest

As the mighty oak does not appear to see

Such things should never happen but they do

In a darkened room, a mother cries

The swallow seeks to build its nest anew

The oak tree lifts its branches to its eyes

Love, Nick