Nature Persists is a hybrid creative writing and nature project experienced online and in-person. It is an initiative spearheaded by founder and facilitator Zena Edwards, and developed through her practice of embodiment and the writing of poetry for well-being. Using poetic language to explore how we can reconnect with the body’s natural defences against urban energy drain, Nature Persists
is an experimental poetics & embodiment practice space for gentle but determined writing for those living in big cities. It encourages reconnection to the quiet power of nature to flex the muscle of sustainable well-being in the urban environment.
Zena curates, organises and facilitates in-person workshops in city parks, green spaces and community gardens and uses a plethora of creative prompts and exercises especially designed to stimulate wonder, play and creative/poetic writing. Each exercise is honed to guide participants to spark the imagination and to tune into their body's ability to innovative it's own radicle well-being.
(Radicle -the embryonic root of the plant, which develops into the future root of the plant.)
Let nature teach you sustainable self-care: refresh & develop your writing practice by exploring nature in big cities & rooting yourself in a creative well-being practice. Discover & be inspired by the body’s natural defence against urban energy drain.
The aim is to inspire participants to begin to tap into the body’s natural adaptive intelligence which can hold the duality and tension of nature in built-up man-made environments. The aim is to assist participants in finding a wholistic balance of comfort and well being between the two.
Nature Persists Online Nature Persists Online a menu of workshops, masterclasses, Crit Clubs and discussion groups that explore writing nature, eco-poetry, the body and its fearless reconnection to quiet power of nature and the human experience in cities.
Through the act of writing, we invite you to join us in this exploration of using words as a conduit and bridge between the urban landscape and the persistence of the natural world within it, and in-turn, learn from the resilience of nature and celebrate ourselves as part of its ecology.
Themes:
Nature Persists: Embracing The Cosmology Of Nature for Urban Well Being
City dwelling, stress levels and 'the whole body is an ear'
Nature having space to be - Trees and plant life with intelligent systems
How human nature and plant life persists
Nature Persists @ Kata Kata
a Sunday with patchy weather. Luck would have it
that the fullness of the earth's biosphere's possibilities are present
a cool breeze rustling the leaves in the Birch, Sycamore and giant Plane trees;
sun beams breaking through the branches and mists
of rain whisper - a mimick rain forest
a flourishing new community garden
the murmur of a small gathering can be seen
from a bedroom window above the shop next door
touching leaves, smile into each other's faces
sniffing leaves, nibbling them, putting berries in tissues for later
a bearded and beanied man and a couple of children
are drawing on sheets of green paper near the low flaming fire pit
attended by a woman breast feeding, talking
into the ear of the new born
a snapshot full of curiosity, discovery and wonder
away from the jarring metal scrap
the wailing sirens and drill of the highroad
a pod of human bodies
the human body, an antenna, a memory bank
absorbs and holds the tension of the noise till it shuts down
pulls up the draw bridge and shuns the world
and then someone sees a leaflet hanging from the library notice board
a social media post, a flyer left on the bus
realises their disconnect, their unplugging
from their body's own inner wisdom that remembers how to heal
maintain balance.
Nature also competes for space to be
trees and plant life, social beings living with empathic root systems
exchanging nutrients with neighbours
to help them out - brothers in branches and sister in roots
human nature and plant life persists
pushes through the tarmac, breaks the brickwork
it does not passively wait for cracks in the concrete to appear
it shouts through the gaps in paving stones.
and humans continue to build
create another underfunded community greening project
tend allotments, campaign for a green wall
and everyday, wake up
go to work and seek inspiration to be stay positive
and on a Sunday attend a workshop in a public garden
walk a dog and push a pram across a green island
in a traffic ocean and breathe in all that is not hopeless.
~Z~