Keening Over The Bones
A Grief Ritual Workshop
Saturday, October 29th, 2pm - 7pm
WORKSHOP IS FULL
The skies are darkening as the chill grows.
Now is the time to peer through the thin veil to the other side.
Together we’ll explore our shadow sadness, always there, integral yet repressed.
The death of a dear one creates waves that forever change you.
Yet every transition in life is the death of one piece of you and the birth of another.
Growing up is the death of the child and the birth of the adult.
Moving somewhere new means losing that which you once knew in order to build a new life.
The end of a relationship is both the death of a future you shared and the beginning of a new path in life.
Do you take the time to care for your heart in these transitions?
Or do you leave the old way hovering, with strings of memories embedded into your bones and pangs of regret in your heart, because you have not taken the time to grieve and let go?
Through movement, stories and ritual, we will connect with what we've lost, give it the love it needs and release it into the fire and the night.
We’ll begin, slowly sheding our layers through non-linear movement: thoughts, stresses, responsibilities, regrets, skin, muscle, until we're down to our bones, that rigid structure that supports us. We will melt through our bones, releasing even our breath until we too turn into dust.
Then we will come together as a circle and share our stories of personal, familial and collective loss. Our words will weave a shared fabric of love-grief, connecting us with heavy-laden heartstrings.
Painting, writing, movement, music… We will use these tools to craft rituals of care and departure to that and those we have lost.
We will close with song, gentle movement and fire, allowing all we have created together to be released into the night.
At all times there will be space to rest and become soft. That being said, please be thoughtful as you consider if this is the right experience for you at this time in your personal grief journey.
This will be a small and intimate group in which we will build trust and connection over the course of the 5-hour workshop.
There will be an optional group dinner at the Rose & Kettle following the workshop. The cost of the dinner is not included in the total workshop cost. Weather permitting, there will also be an optional hot tub soak after dinner, to help soften and care for our bodies.
Workshop cost: $50
The workshop is full
Teacher Bio
Angelica Palmer (she/it) is the founder of The Telegraph School. She has her Masters in Experimental Performance and Social Activism from the New College of California. She teaches a weekly Stretching & Relaxation class, leads monthly Red Tent Women's Gatherings, hosts the annual Wild Women Retreat and has been leading rituals for girls and women for many years. She has led Grief Rituals many times over the last several years and is greatly inspired by the role grief rituals serve to create a community of collective care and release.
She draws from the work of Sobonfu Somé and Dagara people of western Africa, as well the practices of Micheala Boehm and the loss of her dear sister, Vanessa Bley, which has taught her so much.
It is her life’s work to support her community to hold tender and honor all of life’s transitions, allowing the celebrations and the grieving to birth forth much vitality.
Do not stand
By my grave, and weep.
I am not there,
I do not sleep—
I am the thousand winds that blow
I am the diamond glints in snow
I am the sunlight on ripened grain,
I am the gentle, autumn rain.
As you awake with morning’s hush,
I am the swift, up-flinging rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight,
I am the day transcending night.
Do not stand
By my grave, and cry—
I am not there,
I did not die.
— Clare Harner, 1934