Making Memories, Gallery Oldham
Philip writes:
Our afternoon session at Werneth Lodge on 13 February was with a group of older people with a wide range of abilities. We tried a writing technique that's often served us well when there are many voices to accomodate and a number people have difficulty writing. It's a trick that I inadvertently invented when we were working in Stockport, training a student. Two people make notes of a conversation with a participant or participants. The notes are then read back line by line, each reader alternating. This creates an echoing effect, but with lots of variants, because no two people will write exactly the same notes from a conversation. In fact when Lois and I tried it at the workshop in Werneth Lodge, our notes were remarkably different, but the following poem gives a sense of this method.
The conversation was stimulated by Lois' own wedding memorabilia.
wedding ring
white wedding pink flowers / very long time ago
a garter, a rose / married a long time
a helluva long time / ago
a bit of a scent / the faint scent of cloves
we choose to forget / a wedding ring
a buttonhole the men wore / the bride a bouquet
a long white dress / at All Saints
he a carnation / and a party after
white wedding pink flowers / a long time ago
mother / put rollers in
washed, curled around / a petal heart-shaped
pink / garter with little bows
a knees-up / I remember mine well
jump over the table / white wedding, nice
weather a long time / ago
always somebody there to / take a photo
first stockings / a nervous wreck
white pillars / the cake, mother-made
two tears / little white pillars
a cake tin, locked in / for christenings
two figures on top / wearing white
no hanky panky / beforehand
a wedding ring / a wedding band playing
1954 / had a boy in 55
married now and / so it goes round.
Group poem
13 Feb 2013
Oldham
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