The Peace You Hold

Description

The poet Lola Ridge was born in Dublin. She is remembered as an uncompromising Modernist, a political radical, and ardent feminist who wrote poetry on the themes of immigration, politics, and motherhood.  In her youth, she lived on the west coast of the South Island of Aotearoa (New Zealand). In this early nature poem, Ridge conveys the experience of a spiritual awakening as she contemplates this sublime landscape. My brother and his fiancée have been living in New Zealand for the last few years and have visited the town in which Ridge lived—Hokitika. I have been amazed at the photos that they send back from this paradise, a land of incredible scenery and free from COVID. This piece is my imagining of this paradise in music, before I can visit myself and trace the footsteps of Lola Ridge. (May 2021)