On a warm Spring Day of fresh green earth and electric blue skies warmed by a golden sun, my travelling companion, and I came out of meditation by the Well, with an intuition to venture further up Chalice Hill, in search of new beginnings. For a whole year I have journeyed through a long dark tunnel of personal loss, bereavement and change. Obstacles like a landslide of boulders, have been negotiated, removed, or transformed into understanding and wisdom for the ‘NOW.’ I have fallen and almost despaired more than once in this tunnel, but somehow, I got up again, help came, and I carried on. This year, beginning and ending in May, started with a fractured ankle, which even after its healing left me with pain. This was followed by the serious ongoing illness of a loved one and ended with the death of my mother. My recent visit to the Chalice was different, since I was prompted to take the path, above the Well and Sanctuary, finding somewhere to sit close to the summit of Chalice Hill. This spot radiates a great Peace for anyone willing to open their heart to its Presence.
Travelling on with the good friend accompanying me on this glorious day out, we called in St. Margaret’s Chapel, now also dedicated to Mary Magdalene, before heading into Glastonbury for a late lunch. We found a perfect ending to our beautiful day in an old courtyard called The Glastonbury Experience, when we met a young Chinese woman who told us that her name meant wisdom and beauty. All at once, she began to sing in tune with the windchime she was carrying. Things like this happen in Glastonbury. My friend and I both slipped into meditation as her beautiful voice soared, its pure sound washing over us in the late afternoon sunshine. We were three women who had been born into three different nations, harmonic, in our wish for peace across the globe. And isn’t this, what we, the ordinary people of all nationalities and creeds really want? Throughout the world, we are singing, meditating and praying. Try as best you can to hold on to your Light and your Song. Peace, Iona At the end of September, I really found my voice, when I attended a Bardic workshop in Glastonbury. I got to write a poem as part of a group presentation for an Autumn celebration. It went down very well and I was very surprised to hear the power and vitality in my voice, when speaking my own words. My effort appeared to have a positive effect on several people and I in turn was moved by the efforts of others. After the workshop, the facilitators both told me how good it was to hear my voice. When poetry is spoken by the person who wrote it, it becomes energised and the effect can be dynamic - the spoken word might inspire, influence, facilitate change or sometimes even heal according to the intent and abilities of the writer. Of course, the Bards of old practised an oral tradition of poetry and story telling. That is how the legends were passed on. Since the workshop, one of my poems has been published in the monthly newsletter of a Druid organisation with an international membership.
Finding my voice with a live audience was certainly a confidence booster and I don’t think I will ever be nervous about speaking my poetry again. Who knows, I might even develop an ability to tell live stories as well... |
Iona Jenkins
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