People tell stories all the time,
we hardly notice - the story of a day, or a night,
or a holiday, or a job,
but every once in a while, a poet enters the room...
Olenka Natalya Toroshenko, a poet, dancer, singer,
told the story of her ancestors
and of the diaspora of her people to unlikely shores.
She told the remarkable story of her childhood,
simultaneously Canadian and Ukranian,
complicated and enriched by cultural rituals,
sheltered by, and defined within the boundaries
of her cultural community.
She recited the words, in her mother tongue,
of the Ukranian national hero, a poet,
Educate yourselves, learn from many nations
Shedding tears, contorted by joy and grief, she performed her story,
and it felt sometimes as if this were a rite of passage,
that storytelling from the deep well of one's own history,
culture and traditions,
is an initiation into the mother-lode of feelings,
memories and symbols
that are the gifts and responsibilities
of that culture.
And, for me,
to witness this narrative of overlapping waves of meaning,
delivery, style, humour, shadow and light,
was also an initiation,
albeit filtered through all my own cultural assumptions,
memories, symbols and songs,
I entered the cave, I heard the story, I came away changed
and now,
I tell you, in my own small way
of how I was moved
by her movement, by her words, by the conviction in her eyes,
moved to reflect on my own history, culture and upbringing.
People tell stories all the time,
but every once in a while,
a poet enters the room.
**
Post Script
The Ukranian National Hero is Taras Shevchenko and the poem is (in English) called 'My Friendly Epistle". The translation goes like this:
Educate yourselves, my brethren,
Study well, think deep!
Learn from many other nations,
And your wisdom keep!
Who forsakes his own Mother,
Finds no welcome home;
God-forsaken, among strangers
He will always roam.
His own children act like strangers,
Strangely they speak too
Thus forsaken, he will wander
His mistakes to rue!
To buy tickets to her show, follow the link.
But hurry up, she's only performing this week. (Mar 2nd - Mar 6th)
https://adelaidefringe.com.au/fringetix/i-am-root-af2022
