Friends on the way

 Dec 07 – March 08

“There aren’t just tigers and snakes in the jungle of Calcutta”, mused Hasan Pal, “You also meet lambs and doves there...”  from The City of Joy by Dominique Lapierre.

People I met as I backpacked around the world:

Political activists, lawyers, film-makers, psychologists, actors, farmers, artists, missionaries, business people, entrepreneurs, teachers, journalists, students, monks, bus drivers, an artificial limb specialist, priests, nurses, ex-prisoners, volunteers, secretaries, musicians, writers, scientists, chefs, a coffin maker, taxi drivers, rickshaw and tuk-tuk drivers, OTs, a fitness instructor, morris dancers, a village chief, homeless guys, singers, backpackers.

Healing

Sava’ai, Samoa, March 2008

There comes a point in healing where you just have to step out and believe for the fullness of it. It’s easy to get stuck and keep waiting for that fullness, looking at the wounds still sore and too afraid to step out. With the focus still on our frailty we will become frozen. In accepting these frailties but still believing for completion, we are free to step out. To walk in the freedom of healing received and healing yet to come. Our walk is a walk of faith and each one of us has been wounded to a greater or lesser extent. We are called to walk forward with one another and often we will find that in that solidarity, our healing will come.

Residual Sadness

by Lake Tekapo, South Island, New Zealand, 16/03/08

I carry around a residue of sadness

Left over from some past sorrow

That I can never pin down.

This film around my heart

Has remained. And remained.

And I’m past prodding or poking it,

For still, it remains.

And now, in this post supper state,

This beer and brooding moment,

I breathe deep.

I breathe in the turquoise beauty of the water,

The playful swirls of the clouds,

The grey-green thereness of the mountains

And breathe in the now

That will never come again,

And revel in its respite.

Doing battle in the bath

Spring Bank, Hull, Jan 2006

There, beneath the bubbles,

Lying in the womb-like warmth

By the flicker of candlelight,

I fight.

Girding up my best thoughts,

I fire out threats

And put dark whispers

To flight.

In the solitary struggle,

The gentle lift of hope,

The reassuring wink:

It’s alright.

And the bubbles dance,

Though the warmth wanes,

And the candlelight

Shines bright.

Early Morning Stroll

Hull, 2005
Pearson Park, 6 o’clock in the morning

A young couple walk silently

Pushing a red pram.

Inside a baby whimpers

Then yawns, drops his head

And, finally, falls asleep.

 “Thank God!” she says.

“Humdililah!” he says.

He’s older than her, about 5 years.

They met in a nightclub,

A bit worse for wear.

Her on a hen night.

Him just up from Dover.

They’d danced, laughed, kissed,

Swapped numbers.

And a few texts later,

Were going out.

Her family wasn’t happy.

Her being with one of them Kosovans

(He was Kurdish)

One of them thick shits

(He was a lawyer)

Taking all our jobs

(He washed pots to get by).

He looks at her in the early morning light.

She’s so pretty, he still can’t believe it.

How she’s still with him

How he can feel this happy.

A bird skims across the pond and he jumps.

Suddenly his mind is full of bullets

And screams and children running.

His mother bleeding, his father pleading

And soldiers laughing, laughing, laughing….

“Best get back”, she whispers, squeezing his arm.

“I can’t go back”, tears running down his face.

He pulls her to him and starts to cry.
And she holds him.

As the sun peeks over the yellow trees

She holds him.

Still in her pyjamas

She holds him.

With her scuffed black trainers and tangled hair,

She holds him.

Nearby a man out walking his dog coughs.

And a jogger flits by with heavy beats pinned to his ears.

“Best get back,” she says again.

 “Best get back” he sighs

And slowly, they peel apart

And head towards the gate.

I remember writing this thinking of a Kurdish man I knew who was a massive inspiration to me at the time. His story was one of incredible resilience. And incredible pain. Back then I was struggling with depression and a feeling of stuckness. Often feeling overwhelmed and not knowing how to move on from some things. It helped going out for walks though. And one day whilst walking past the duckpond in Pearson Park, I got the idea to write this piece. The first thing in ages that was about someone else and not about me! So in that sense it was a healing thing. Getting me out of myself and trying to imagine life in someone else’s shoes. The depression still lingered for a while afterwards but at least I’d begun to get some perspective. And feel connected to the world around me again.

All my friends have a life

the last time I saw Mary, Stepney, East London, Sept 2004

“All my friends have a life,” she says,

Exhausted from lying in her bed.

Drained by people bustling around,

Trying to make her comfortable.

Visitors chatting about their plans

Like Debbie who’s off to Afghanistan.

Mother sits nearby, pretending to do the crossword,

Brother strolls by, eyeing up the morphine.

Sisters drop by, phone, pray,

Do their crying in the kitchen,

Take turns when to stay.

For an hour – a whole hour – we watch EastEnders.

Two episodes, back to back.

After I try to speak but the words soon dissolve.

You panic, “Don’t tell me you’re not coming back!”

So I quickly mop up. And backtrack.

Advice

from the writer, Michele Roberts after a reading in Beverley, 18/10/03

Cherish the leaden memories;

The hard, heavy regrets

That you say lay like

A seam across your soul.

Do not hack away

With cruel, vengeful force.

Rather, be kind

And take care of them.

For they have been there

For a reason

And have protected you

For a long, long time.