Soul

“The soul is a verb, not a noun” David Mitchell, ‘The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet’

Today began with a meeting with Ciarán Hodgers. Ciarán, originally from Drogheda, just a short hop across the Irish Sea from Liverpool, is the Winner of the 2015 Pangaea Poetry International Slam, amongst other awards. We’re working on a joint project which I’ll doubtless Blip about later in the year but which, I think, has the potential to be pretty darn cool. I was struck by his tattoo which, he revealed, was inspired by the writing of the author David Mitchell, of whom I’m also a big fan.

Here’s Ciarán performing his poem ‘Exit Wounds’ www.youtube.com/watch?v=ChQer1zVVCY

The day ended with a community meeting at The Playhouse, followed by a preview of the phenomenal piece of theatre which is ‘A Pacifist’s Guide to the War on Cancer’ by Bryony Kimmings. Performed by a company of 6 women including Kimmings herself and the astonishing Lara Veitch, a 28 year old who has had cancer 7 times - the first time before she was even born! - the piece featured song, dance, the dramatised personal testimonies of cast members, the stories of other women whom Kimmings had interviewed, the writings of inspirational women such as Audre Lorde, Jo Spence, Barbara Ehrenreich and Susan Sontag, and a ‘guest’ testimony from a local woman speaking about her own experience of breast cancer and the role that painting has played in helping her through it. It was both laugh-out-loud funny and sob-out-loud upsetting. But always moving and inspiring, and much of it could be applied to mental health as well, and, indeed, to life in general.

As Audre Lorde said “In becoming forcibly and essentially aware of my mortality, and of what I wished and wanted for my life, however short it might be, priorities and omissions became strongly etched in a merciless light, and what I most regretted were my silences. Of what had I ever been afraid? To question or to speak as I believed could have meant pain, or death. But we all hurt in so many different ways, all the time, and pain will either change or end. Death, on the other hand, is the final silence. And that might be coming quickly now, without regard for whether I had ever spoken what needed to be said, or had only betrayed myself into small silences, while I planned someday to speak, or waited for someone else’s words. I was going to die, if not sooner then later, whether or not I had ever spoken myself. My silences had not protected me. Your silence will not protect you.”

You can see the cast discussing cancer in the video here www.everymanplayhouse.com/whats-on/a-pacifists-guide-to-the-war-on-cancer (that’s Bryony Kimmings in the yellow jumper and Lara Veitch with the wonderful tattoo which she had done right across her chest following a double mastectomy).

Today’s song comes from a woman who’s come through cancer and so much else... It’s Marianne Faithfull with ‘The Ballad of Lucy Jordan’ www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0NxhFn0szc