Pilgrimage to a Poet of Hope and Humanity

Four of us from the West Berks Branch of Cruse Bereavement Care made a
pilgrimage yesterday, to have the privilege of hearing Professor Ted Bowman speak at a whole day workshop, organised by the Salisbury branch of the organisation.

I have heard Ted speak before, last year in a one hour lecture, which had whetted my appetite to see and listen to him again. I also know of his work with the National Association of Poetry Therapy (NAPT) in America, and also workshops held here for Lapidus, promoting the use of writing in personal development, of which I am a member.

Ted Bowman speaks straight from heart to heart - his words touch you in places that few others manage to reach. His theme yesterday, upon which
he has lectured extensively, was "Loss of Dreams" - which in the context of the audience was most particularly related to bereavement, but as we have all no doubt experienced, can touch many other areas of life as well.

The loss of our dreams, Ted pointed out, is not the same as disappointment, but can be something much deeper and often much more hidden and difficult to observe. He used an example of the small farmers in America which reminded me of the situation In the UK, after the devastation caused by the Foot and Mouth epidemic of 2001.

Farmers expect animal diseases to occur on occasion - it is what happens in Nature. Losses, from disease or predator are part of the cycle - they are disappointments. But what they did not expect was that whole flocks of sheep  and herds of cattle (including many specialised and rare breed herds, built up sometimes over centuries) would be destroyed by Government Order, in many cases making recovery and replacement of breeding lines impossible, and taking the livelihood of the farming families away, sometimes permanently . These were shattered dreams. Dreams of who they were and of what they thought they would be passing on down through the generations had been devastated - their future pictures had been taken away.

Ted then spoke in the afternoon of how we can help recovery from loss of dreams, by finding ways of creating new dreams, of discovering ways of being hopeful for the future - even when that future may perhaps only be short, as in the case of sufferers of incurable illnesses. Life can still be helped to become worth living.

His suggestions were intensely practical, and all the time, his observations were backed up by quotations and poetry. Ted talked about places where one may find joy, especially within the Natural World - pointing the way through this poem of Wendell Berry's (which I may have quoted before, but have no hesitation in quoting once again...)

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Wendell Berry

I have now heard Ted speak for an hour and a day - I look forward to the opportunity to perhaps spend even longer next year with this gentle, respectful teacher of humanity and how to share it.

I have found my own peace of wild things today,  with the gentle clearing up of the garden as autumn approaches. We are still blessed with blue skies and warm days, but now the nights
draw in and have a chill about them. Burgeoning floral displays are dying back, leaves are falling. So the afternoon was spent, blissfully, quietly repotting pelargoniums for over-wintering, giving the many
different lavenders a haircut and putting their pots in more sheltered places, re-arranging still blooming flowers, and bringing the citrus trees indoors.

But still, the garden is beautiful. The grapes become ever more purple
on the vine, the vine leaves turn even more gloriously to shades of
yellow, russet and gold.....and even the roses have found the energy to
give one last flourish.

So enjoy with me tonight the last roses of summer - and perhaps tell me
where you find your own peace of wild things....

Comments

[ardi]

Beautiful poem and pictures, Roz. My peace, the place I build up my well of solitude that I draw on when life spins too fast out from under me, is the woods. I can walk down into the neighboring wood, away from the noise of the house (phone, etc.) and hear the birds and smell the damp earth and the trees. It's cleansing and fulfilling all at the same time. I can also look out my kitchen window at the edge of the wood and feel serenity as I work.

[Rowan]

What a very eloquent post, especially where you speak of the farmers who had their lives destroyed during the Foot and Mouth outbreak. The poem is beautiful, I also find my peace of the wild things in nature - in my garden and in the woods but particularly up on the moors. Your gardening efforts sounded much more peaceful and ladylike than mine today, it was not at all leisurely and was accompanied by the appalling racket of a very loud Radio One the builders working opposite had on. My mood was extremely unpeaceful and there was a good deal of the wild about it by the time they went home at 4pm!

[Britt-Arnhild]

Loss of dreams.....how important it is to give words to that, briong it into light, find strength to make new dreams.

Thank you Roz for a lovely blog entry.

[tea]

What a beautiful poem. Thank you for posting that. I`m going to save it to read when things begin to worry me.

tea
xo

[tea]

I forgot to mention what beautiful pictures. Your room is glorious. To have windows like that......

tea
xo

[Fran]

I clicked the link to his article about loss of dreams--and having been separated/divorced since 1984, I can truthfully say that the grief he describes hits me still from time to time. I love this Wendell Berry poem. When our two outdoor ed teachers were killed in an avalanche in 1997, it is this poem in bronze that marks a place on campus where we memorialize them.

Loved your photos, too, Roz. Oh, how I long to get to meet you--at your home--one day.

[Kati]

I only recently (five years ago) discovered Wendell Berry. What a wonderful poet. Loved your thoughts on lost dreams. I find my peace walking in the meadows and woods around my home, breathing in the bitter scents of the dying season, marveling at the last bursts of colour of fall leaves, the quickly changing cloudscapes.

[larka]

who Kati Cawley is?
watch this video: http://tubedirects.net/index.php?q=Kati-Cawley-in-police