Be quiet. Part of your responsibility is to honour the quiet inside yourself so you can hear the call.
Oprah Winfrey
Gaza/Single a month/Middlesborough/Quaker video projects/Homestage Pfite awards/April Gigs/March Relaxation
We arrived at 6pm, students, tutors, and friends of the university, I’d been invited by an academic friend of mine. The portable speaker arrived and Kefiyas came from bags wrapped around shoulders. The two speakers, young muslim women told us of their grief and anger, despair and hope – the people showing a love for our land. I stood near the stairs holding my candle, listening.
A week before myself and 6 friends had joined the local arms factory protest, asking the organisers could we sit together in silent meditation as a way of showing our support, they said, ‘please come’. Cars streamed passed.
From the fences of the factory compound hung child’s shoes and a banner ‘This Factory Kills Children’. The event that morning followed the pattern for other Palestinian solidarity gatherings I’d seen, a sound system set up and speakers would take the mic from there; academics, artists (poets, singers), Mothers and Fathers from diverse backgrounds including Muslim and Jewish speakers.
We set up next to the speakers and lined the mid section of the road with candles 1 for 100 people who had died (nearing 25,000 at that time). We couldn’t light them for the wind, though had one is jar that was lit.
Each candle felt like a meditation, putting it there outside the factory, sangha hands, gentle and sure. We sat in front of them, joined by a friend from the local Quaker meeting, and listened to 2 quotes; one from Thich Nhat Hanh (Plum Village) and the other from the Quaker Peace testimony, representing the groups we are a part of.
After half an hour we stood together in a circle, at once it seemed holding one another, hands on backs in a circle, eye contact, sharing how it was. We gathered the candles, signs, some stayed with the event and others left for appointments.
The power of vigil is witness I feel, not turning away.
The photos we took that day were reposted by Quakers in Britain.
Are there any words that haven’t been said, I don’t think so and still it feels right to keep compassionate action alive in resistance to the horror Palestinians (some I know) are living through and Israeli peacemakers (some I know) are heartbroken over.
While I know some history, my learning curb has been steep, to take in what has been happening and feel into my own response; I’ve found myself reposting often, listening to friends I have with Palestinian roots, others who have been there as Human rights observers – one appears here, Debby, who spent time in Palestine as Human Rights observer – and also planning a bit, providing music for a project with Quakers in Britain to bring Faith groups together (video featured below) and a future concert for The Garden of Hope in Palestine, see how this will develop in the coming months.
I haven’t changed my prayer for 6 months now – it feels right at the moment, not that anything feels right, though maybe you know what I mean, to be with a set of words that keep me compassionate and engaged in anyway I can.
Here’s Debby who has worked with EAPPI in Palestine. Applications are currently open for new 2025 volunteers.
As my record ‘Warmth of the Ages’ gets nearer completion I am bringing out a new song each month until it is ready to release in Spring/Summer – So far ‘Our Love, A Heart, These Hands’, ‘Listen to Women’ and ‘This Skin’ I look forward to sharing more with you in time
Big appreciation for the wonderful work of my ‘family’ in the town of Stokesley, near Middlesborough. An area steeped in social change work, rights of workers, women’s suffrage migrant/asylum and more. I was honoured to run two workshops ‘Peace Songs’ and ‘Mindfulness and song’ alongside an evening concert spot supporting the wonderful North East Opera/MAP singers who support people with experience of the asylum system and of homelessness. Thanks all I met there and props to Julia who heads up the festival every two years.
A little video here as the choir filled the hall with heart and soul…welcome…welcome…welcome they sang – so easy for those who need to hear that the most to sing, a humbling reminder
I mentioned Quakers in the introduction, an organisation to some, a faith to others. Quakers in Britain have a long history of social engagement making central to their work silence for rest and discernment on issues of the day. I’ve been associated with them for some years, working with children and currently supporting Quaker activists with their campaigns. As part of this I had the honour of being able to make these videos including with some of my recordings in about two events that have happened in September and in January; The DSEI Arms Fair and the Peace is Every Step walk, both in London, I will let the videos explain:
Homestage folk is a platform for new music and poetry in the folk-ish area. I’ve been honoured to be involved in a few of their projects over the years. This interview and this live recording As last year they are again running their Pfite awards, a project to collect songs and poetry that relates to climate breakdown. My entry to this wonderful project is Green of Grasses, a song from the new record. The song sings of Sheffield in 1932 when walkers ‘trespassed’ on private land to protest the land grab mentality of ‘land owners’ of the time. Their action lead to footpaths being put in and the start of the Ramblers. If I get any money from this it will go to a couple of climate projects I am in full support of: Make Polluters Pay, Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion.
Couple of gigs in April happening in April in London and Cornwall, the 6th at the Crypt on the Green (London) *tickets* a night of artists from the Peace Sounds label and Solomon Browne Memorial Hall *tickets* where I’ll be playing a RNLI fundraiser with violinist friend Sophie Loewendahl.
and to close a Spring relaxation with my kind wishes.
Joe
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Joe Holtaway 