healingwords: poetry for the soul

This is where I would like to be today. There is no more to say. 

This image is of the 'Gorg del Salt', the waterfall cascading into a deep green pool, part of the river system known as the 'Barranc de L'encantá', the Ravine of the Enchanted. The river cuts through the rock, collecting in pools and falls.  The legend of the Enchanted is a local myth dating back to when these lands were populated by the descendants of the Arab Kingdom of Al Andalus. When Felipe III decreed the expulsion of the Moorish population the people of the Vall de Gallinera were forced to leave. The legend states that they left a wonderful treasure hidden in a cave in the Barranc, which stretched for 14 kilometres from the village of Planes to the mouth of the river Serpis near the village of Beniarrés. The treasure was guarded by a young women who was enchanted to be its guardian. Various versions tell that she was a beautiful maid from the waist up, with the lower body of a goose, who wore a golden crown that shone with sunlight when she left her c...

I am the world's worst traveller, all kinds of transport provoke travel sickness but I think being on water is my least favoured option. I have endured many difficult sea crossings and would never volunteer to get on a boat. However this tranquil scene attracted me, reminded me of rowing boats on the River Avon long ago. I could imagine the peace of slowly paddling on a gentle river with bird song and dragonflies to keep me company. © 2019 Jacqueline Knight Cotterill.  All rights reserved.  

Soon after my father died I spent a few days with dear friends in their hillside home near Carno in mid Wales. A beautiful place where surrounded by their love and nature I started healing. This poem was inspired by our walk in the Hafren Forest, by the river where trees, tears, childhood memories and myth combined.   HABREN'S TEARS Here in the now time, midst wooded familiar, etched stones of ancestors,  North people, brooding, in my blood, my bones. Walk in the Hafren,  glimpse ghost self, dancing through shadows of pine brushed ink strokes, plimsolls slipping on jewelled moss quilt. Consoling boardwalk, meditative step on step memories lapped by gurgling waters, skipping on slate, bubbles rising, the infant Sabren at play. Light fades into gloaming, damp enveloping, wrapped in mist shroud, melt into brume, bearded forest consumes. Caught tight in stillness;  sorrows drowned in Hab...