Unfinished Business - The Big Mama Jama part 1

So, I found this old piece I had started back in, oh, say, around 2002 or so. It's one stanza from a poem by Padraig O Maille about being exiled and missing home. I had planned it out, done all the lettering, and sketched out most of the border and decorations. Then I stopped. My memory is such that I can't remember why I stopped (my guess is school?) or why I was doing it in the first place (fun, probably). But as I looked at it, I remembered what fun I used to have doing these insanely complicated illuminations. So, as a challenge to myself, I decided to finish it. Easier said than done. I can't even remember what I had in mind for some of the designs (they were apparently ones I made up all by myself), and my plans were nothing more than a rough sketch. No help there. I did manage to find some parts of the illumination in various books of mine, so using those as a guide I began filling in the blanks. I had NO IDEA how hard that would be. Let's say my hands were not happy. And I begin to despair of ever being able to go to school again.
This is a close-up of what I've done so far. The slightly darker pencil lines are my current work, while the faded, smudged stuff on the left is what I found. The pattern is a bird and the tree of life spilling out of these cup-looking things.

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