plate techtonics - the hidden layer

i forgot to mention what finally nudged me into stitching my plate ......

after my Takotsubo episode i wanted to do a stitched piece about it - inspired is the wrong word, but the right one won't pop up - i've toyed with a few ideas, but nothing stuck

earlier this year, after a radio programme about Takotsubo, i found a Facebook support group which has been a revelation - i have found out so much more about the condition and read lots of other people's stories - someone posted a picture of a japanese ceramic bowl repaired with gold, a technique called Kintsugi - the idea of a repair making something more beautiful or valued really jumped out at me ..... that was what i wanted to do with my plate ...... but it was also what had happened to my heart, repeatedly through living and loving as well as following my Takotsubo

....another japanese way of responding to life which encapsulates so much so succinctly

i could not repair my plate with gold (but i might still find a way round that!) but i could translate it into textile and stitch - and, as it turned out, the process was very soothing and therapeutic at a time when i needed it

then, this week someone else posted the same Kintsugi bowl picture (it clearly speaks to many of us) and someone else posted a poem she had written - poetry isn't my thing but these words fitted me and my kintsugi process

thank you Alison Ashwell - without you this would have remained unspoken

In the ashes, all I could see were the shards of my heart

Shearing through flesh
And bone
Slipping through the cracks in my shattered life.
My soul screamed.
I was
The walking dead
Empty but for soul ache
And pockets filled with bleeding fragments

And a tiny crumb
Of hope.
the memory of a word l'd read long before, a lifeline to the future.

I would Kintsugi my heart, my life, my soul 

creating something exquisite

From the splinters of bones

Battered and scarred but rebuilt

with seams of gold

Stronger; more precious and beautiful 

than before

Alison Ashwell


Comments

Popular Posts