'TO-DAY IS BIG WITH BLESSINGS'

JO ANDREAE,—READING, ENGLAND

Over weekends for the past few months, a friend and I have been walking the pathway known as Offa's Dyke, which forms the boundary between England and Wales. Amidst rolling green hills at the southern end, are the ruins of Tintern Abbey, made famous by English Romantic poet William Wordsworth (1770–1850).

While we were being guided around the site, I was fascinated to learn what the abbey once was like—when it was built, who lived there, and how they lived. But I was less engaged by this cultural history lesson than I was by the beauty of the ruins as we found them in the afternoon light on the day of our visit.

This particular image of the repeating archways leading the viewer's eye out to the Welsh countryside grabbed my attention. It occurred to me that were it not for the abbey's dilapidated state—with no roof and with grass growing everywhere—this image would not exist.

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