Solitude is a wise companion, who makes us listen, carefully, to the quiet voice of our heart. The one that the world's noise tries to silence, wants us to dismiss. It feels like time these days moves in two opposite directions, tearing itself apart. It runs too fast, in the direction of total chaos, unstoppable, enraged, drunk on power's addiction and greed, and it moves in slow - motion trying to understand its lost direction. Life as we understand it, as humans, is composed of a number of years, we see it as linear, and this creates the illusion, that what can go forward, like a train on a track, can also be reversed. But, there comes a point in our life's journey, that that line forward seems less distance removed from its horizon, its arrival to that platform where we get out, and there is no further travel in this time, in this dimension. It is a sobering moment, especially realizing I am the sole survivor of my family: my two younger sisters died at 35 and 44, and my brother five years ago at age 61, and both my parents at age 74 and 79, all this loss between 1998 and 2008, with the exception of the loss of my brother which was in 2020, but family alienation had made 1998 the last time I saw him, in Georgia, at our youngest sister's very tense funeral. A few cousins and the youngest surviving sister of my father, still communicate with me by phone and via social media. I have not seen them in what will soon be close to 40 years, they live far away, in my native Belgium, where I was last that many years ago. I thought about a boneyard, about how what family I had, is mostly gone, and revisiting the family I have left, is vanishing in the fallout of past trauma and loss, and the rumbling uncertainty and anxiety of the world's unnerving daily news that promises only endless difficulty and hardship, wars, and destruction, with no guidance, no reversal that gives credible relief, or solid hope. To me, hope for my poet's heart and soul, had come in the meeting of the spirit and culture, ancient and resilient, of North Africa, specifically, of Kabylie in the coastal and mountainous northern parts of Algeria. Kabylie gave me my voice as a poet, and since 2017, is a bright star to my muse, and has given life to 13 books I have since written and published to celebrate this unique literary - cultural odyssey, in prose and poetry, with more in the works. The North Star in this amazing story of rebirth, of giving life to my creative identity, is the collaboration with my colleague of Aokas, the Kabyle photographer Nacer Amari of Tassi Photographie. I was able to meet my colleague, in Tunis, Tunisia, together with his cousin, Mounir Amari, who had agreed to accompany him on the trip by bus to first Constantine, and then by taxi across the border into Tunisia to arrive at the hotel Carlton where we all had reservations, in Tunis, for them both, and my husband, our son and his best friend, and myself, for 3 days, the time my colleague and his cousin could take off work. The years so far, going on 6 already, I have been able to work with Nacer Amari, which has already produced 7 books, with 2 more in the making, and 12 pieces of art in the form of pencil, ink, colored pencil and metallic thread embroideries, inspired all by his photography, are a remarkable source of joy, of healing, of transformation, of new life to my heart and soul, my spirit, so long isolated, so long without voice, so long invisible. This creative joy, has given me so much hope, so much pride, gratitude, dignity. The chaos of the world today, the frustration of not being able to see clear in it, to have to wait, and wish fervently, that the day will come when travel to Europe, to North Africa, as a Flemish born poet with an American passport, will be possible again, will be no longer impeded, because of all the waves of current economic and political uncertainty is counterbalanced by Kabylie and its spirit, my colleague Nacer Amari's generous, wise and tolerant heart, makes bearable the sadness of the distance, of the separation, that is demanded of living in these circumstances I face to right now, so far away from where I was born, and so far away from the shores of Northern Algeria, where my poems breathe, live, love, sing and wait. The Persian poet and Sufi mystic Rumi, has said, "Love is everything", and that thought written by a wise, learned soul, so long ago, as he lived from 1207 - 1273, gives me peace, allows me to live in the present, after having lived so long in the turmoil of anguish, of loneliness, before being introduced to Kabylie via the music of the troubadour Idir via my French former roommate from graduate school in Austin, Texas, Catherine B. who as I learned in Strasbourg 2 years ago, on our way to Tunis, when I was reunited with her, after not having seen each other in 35 years - is Kabyle on her father's side of the family. Before 2017, all there was for my shattered poet's heart, was so much pain, and trauma of having lost my family in such terrible circumstances: suicide, cancer, betrayal, contempt... My heart had gone numb, and all there remained, was a wounded past and a failure to make sense of it. My connection to Kabylie and the focus given creatively by the exchange artistically with my colleague Nacer Amari, has healed that deep wound. It has also given me peace, has allowed me to leave the hurts and the losses behind, and to grow roots in the present. It also allows me to not worry about the future, as the gratitude and joy of that collaboration with him has left deep resonances of the resilience, the strength in my soul, in my heart. The result is a sense of freedom, strong, anchored deep in the center of my soul, leaving all anxiety behind. I do not know if I will have the chance to see my colleague in Aokas, Algeria again. That can really hurt, but, the overwhelming feeling is and will always remain : gratitude that now my life is a peaceful solitude, where the boneyard in my mind, is one that sees Berber flowers of love amidst the ruin, that hears whistling among the bones of the dead and lost, a Kabyle melody of hope, in a voice that says with great conviction of its clear notes: love, not time, heals all wounds, as love's healing transformation gives time back dignity, both to the time lost, and to the time left. Love and its wisdom, and the space and creative, healing energy it creates, as the Persian poet Jalal al - Din Muhammad Rumi knew a 1000 years ago, and as my Kabyle artist photographer knows, and as I now know, is everything. It is the artist's and poet's rebel heart's rising phoenix, forever reborn, forever free.
Trudi Ralston
"Tes actes de gentillesse sont les ailes iridescentes de l'amour divin, qui restent et continuent d'encourager autrui, long apres leur partage." - RUMI.
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