'Yugen' is a Japanese term used to refer to a 'profound and mysterious sense of beauty about the universe'. It is a term I came across the other day in Alan Watts' The Book (on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are). Previously, it had always taken me two or three sentences to convey this sense, if not a whole page. Now, happily, I have a single word!
According to the Japanese poet Fujiwara Shunzei (1114-1204), Yugen was the highest form of poetic expression. It is a state of cloudy impenetrability that is beyond the madness of measuring that modern society is so obsessed with. Yugen, effectively, transcends definition and is perhaps better understood outwith the intellect and rather as an enactive philosophy, say, on a walk in a forest without prospect of an end, or watching a full moon glow in a starry night sky. Similarly, it could be watching a skein of geese passing through the sky...
This squad of pink-footed geese (Anser brachyrhynchus) has come in to the Kelvin Valley just behind Summerston from Greenland or Iceland to winter. These wintering populations
have risen markedly over the last 50 years, largely
due to their now protected status and, consequently, not being shot!
Numbers of
wintering geese in Britain have risen almost tenfold from 30,000 in
1950 to 292,000 in October 2004. This lot regularly come in to the farms
at the back of Summerston to feed and breed. To see and hear them
coming in to land can only be described as 'yugen'. If you can excuse
the pun, it's the sort of sight that gives me goosebumps every time.
The River Kelvin snakes its way just behind this field and if you follow
the muddy riverside path south from Balmuildy Bridge (on Balmore Road)
you might see some other birds on the river: a variety of ducks,
kingfishers, and large gatherings of rooks and crows in the tall trees at the edge of Killermont Golf Course. The path then
veers off to John Paul Academy in Summerston, and Caldercuilt Road which
eventually leads up to Maryhill Road. It's a great walk at the back
door to the city.
29.01.2011
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