Monday 7 December 2015

Hidden Stories 2

The White Horse at Osmington, nr Weymouth

Today is the last Hidden Stories writing workshop this term. The theme is Home and Homeland - what home means to us, and the journey involved in leaving, returning to and finding home.

The subject is inspired by Elizabeth de Haas who travelled from her home in Holland in the 1940s to be Dorothy Walker's companion at
7 Hammersmith Terrace,  the last authentic arts and crafts house interior in Britain.

We'll be looking at poems by Bernard O Donaghue and ex Fulham Cross student, Safa, who attended the Write 2Be Me project in 2012. This is her poem, Moving To Another Country.

Moving to Another Country 
It's all confusing
don't know what direction
you're meant to go,
everything is different
you're lost.
All the places are strange to you,
moving to another country
that's a lot different from your country.
It's all confusing
don't know what direction to go
I feel lost.
Everything is different to me
all the places are strange.
Moving to a country
that is a lot different from my country,
all my mind is confused.

I also love Bernard O Donaghue's Westering Home. It reminds me of the feeling I experience each time I visit Dorset where I was born, especially if travelling through the New Forest. We used to picnic there and say goodbye to the rest of the family on our way back to our new home in Kent.

Here we are - me with my aunty Margy on the picnic rug, my sister, Mum, great aunties and Grandad in front of Margy's Ford Anglia in 1967. My Dad is taking the photo.