birthing peace

an invitation: the quiet power of creativity

A long time ago I decided that I wanted to be a gentle encourager of transformational change. That phrase comes back to me over and over again, in almost all that I do.

It came to me again yesterday, in my second writing in community session of the week. My beautiful friend sent me the poem Ariel by Carol Ann Duffy to use as a prompt, as a jumping off point, as inspiration. Ariel starts with a bee sucking insecticides from cowslip. To begin with, all I could conjure was hopelessness and despair.

No bird follow the plough-

even the insects have gone.

The soil so sterile

only one thing will grow.

Of course I feel hopeless and despairing. Our planet has changed beyond recognition in a few short generations. I am not yet 40 years old, and I see how humanity’s relationship with the Earth has shifted to be invisible at best and exploitative at worst. Last night, I noticed the heaviness in my heart and in my whole body. We do not live in a fair world, in a just world. We do not live in a world governed by “love implementing the demands of justice” or in a world were justice is “power correcting everything that stands against love”.¹ We live in a world where we kill the creatures upon which we are dependent for survival. I am talking about bees but I am also talking about people. Ar scáth a chéile a mhaireann na daoine - it is in each others’ shadow that people live. We live in a world of genocide, murder, war and terror.

What is there to do?

I am afraid I am ever practical, ever pragmatic and even sometimes known as ‘Germanically literal’.

For me there is only really one thing to do: hold on to hope.

The solutions to the problems of this world (and there are oh so many) will not be found in hopelessness and despair. Solutions, hacks, ways through and around, new paths and breakthroughs… they all come from hope. More than that, they come from imagination, from creativity.

My kind of depressing start last night shifted when I decided to look for hope. I recalled a video I saw on IG which explained how scientists have discovered that flowers emit frequencies to let bees know when they have lots of pollen. No frequency, no pollen - go search elsewhere bee friend. I think it is amazing that there is still so much we don’t know, still so much we don’t have words for, still so much for science to ‘discover’. What solutions might lie in that we don’t yet know?

It also got me wondering if we emit frequencies, and what they might sound like. Imagine the buzz of someone with plenty to share and a desire to share it. What would loneliness sound like, or longing?

Surely the sound of contentment is the hum of a round bumblebee on a warm summer evening.

Follow it’s meandering path from colour to colour, scent to scent.

Listen to what they have to tell you.

How we manage to hold onto hope is deeply, deeply personal. I find hope in community, in creativity and in being that gentle encourager wherever I go. Recently, I have found it in virtual writing spaces, where I go back to righting myself over and over again.

It is in that spirit I offer an invitation to a small creative community. An hour of writing with others who are searching for ways to keep hold of hope in these times. There will be space but absolutely no pressure to share. I would like to hold this every month, and I will share the details here and on IG.

I wrote this recently, in community, thinking about birthing peace:

Birthing something takes us beyond what we thought possible;
beyond what we thought we could survive.
The first time we go beyond our own imaginations
into a brand new future
where we do not shun the pain that brought us here;
we don't forget the things that went wrong;
we don't set aside the heartbreak;
we bring them with us 
into something new and delicate.
Beautiful and fragile as a summer dandelion.

I hope to see you soon. To gather together and write / right ourselves hopeful.

1. Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love - Martin Luther King Jr.