Original song written for her mother by Pamela Holm (guitar and lead vocal). With Bev Shaw on violin, Heather Holm on accordion, Bev and Heather plus Dorcas Beaton, Valerie Bellamy and Heather Kristenson on backup vocals, and Peter Heron on djembe.
Pamela Holm
My mother wrote this poem about 1977. I remember her dancing around the kitchen, so pleased with the verses she had created. After she died, I rediscovered the poem and set it to music, trying to convey the excitement she had expressed about writing it. Some day I’ll make a better recording of the song.
The words are below the video.
I found a place where Angelica grows
I found a place where Angelica grows,
In Sydney Harbour, where marsh birds incline.
I went there one mist-bounded, warm April morning
With three eager children, sea-treasures to find.
They found pretty sea shells, pearl blue in the water;
They splashed through snow rivers and dampened their clothes;
Pieces of driftwood they vowed they would cherish,
And I found a place where Angelica grows.
Angelica, sea-loving gentle white flower,
Was brought here from France, so an old legend goes;
To Louisbourg’s cold rocky land by the sailors,
Who, longing for home, threw its seed on our shores.
Today, ‘gainst the stone of Louisbourg’s ramparts
One sees the white flower lend its grace through the mists;
Its lacy-like bloom has outlasted the generals,
Outlasted the cannons, and maids sailors kissed.
The old legend says that the seeds in the New World
Grow only at Louisbourg, speak France’s woes.
Imagine my joy on that moist April morning
When I found a place where Angelica grows!
The past haunted me as of history borning
As I gathered the children sea-wet from their toes,
Their pockets were crammed to the full with their findings,
But I found a place where Angelica grows.
~ Poem by June (Holm) Maginley c. 1977
The feminist movement represents, for the most part, the younger, well-educated woman who chooses to have a career, or decides to stay home for a few years to nurture her children. She feels in control of her life.
But there is a large group of women, mostly over forty, who stayed home all of their married years, caring for husbands and children, who feel powerless and out of control. Color them grey, because that is how they see themselves. They have been so conditioned to self-giving by our male-oriented culture, the exploitation of humanity by the advertising media, and the misinterpretation of Jesus’ teaching by church institutions, that they feel themselves to be zeros, nothings.
When Jesus said “love thy neighbour as thyself,” he meant that we should love and value ourselves as much as we value anyone else. Quite a contrast with many of the hidden and open messages aimed at women through the years. How can we give of ourselves if we haven’t time, energy, space and money and, most of all the belief that we are of value, to find out who we are and to develop our talents? When we insist on time for our self-growth, we aid in the growth of others, our daughters develop attitudes of self-respect, our sons and husbands realize that we are more than household caretakers.
In our culture, many wives are expected to take care of all the household tasks, the emotional well-being of the children, struggle with an ever-rising cost of living, so hubby can play with his snow-mobile, motorcycle, gold clubs, and other toys. And she is expected to be grateful when she gets her payment Saturday night.
What to do about it? First of all, realize that this is your one time around. The Lord loves you as much as anyone else. Start exercising those decision muscles by making some decisions on your own, even if they are only tiny ones. If you feel fat and forty, lose weight. Get a new hairdo. Join a new group that gives you a lift. Take a course in something that’s fun. Get the paperback “I’m OK, You’re OK” at a bookstore or the library and read it. Do something. Then something else. And something else.
[Pamela put this poem to music and sang it at June’s memorial service. Click here for video.]
I found a place where Angelica grows,
In Sydney Harbour, where marsh birds incline.
I went there one mist-bounded, warm April morning
With three eager children, sea-treasures to find.
They found pretty sea shells, pearl blue in the water;
They splashed through snow rivers and dampened their clothes;
Pieces of driftwood they vowed they would cherish,
And I found a place where Angelica grows.
Angelica, sea-loving gentle white flower,
Was brought here from France, so an old legend goes;
To Louisbourg’s cold rocky land by the sailors,
Who, longing for home, threw its seed on our shores.
Today, ‘gainst the stone of Louisbourg’s ramparts
One sees the white flower lend its grace through the mists;
Its lacy-like bloom has outlasted the generals,
Outlasted the cannons, and maids sailors kissed.
The old legend says that the seeds in the New World
Grow only at Louisbourg, speak France’s woes.
Imagine my joy on that moist April morning
When I found a place where Angelica grows!
The past haunted me as of history borning
As I gathered the children sea-wet from their toes,
Their pockets were crammed to the full with their findings,
But I found a place where Angelica grows.
June Maginley c. 1977
Morning sun shines on the worn oak table,
October is passing
But summer is paused, held, by a bouquet of flowers,
Nasturtiums,
In an old glass egg-cup.
Brilliant red, golds, oranges, all variations,
Pale and bright splashes of each colour
On five translucent petals,
Painted by faeries, creative.
Their fragrance gentle, lingers.
But five degrees of frost last night guarantees —
These are the last flowers of summer.
June Maginley, October 25, 2012
Rain falls upon my garden, newly dug.
A robin, quite unmindful of the rain
Cocks her pert head and listens for
the worm turning.
Afternoon tea, for robins, in my garden newly dug.
Newly dug gardens, a patch of rich brown in green field.
Only the gardener sees the blues, pinks and yellows,
Smells the sweet scents, sees the patterns that hope and labour
And Mother Earth will yield.
The gentle rain falls softly through the night.
Only the worms that robins didn’t catch
Can see the seedlings and little roots absorb,
Swell, grow and outreach as upwardly they stretch,
Become the incarnation of the dream
The Gardener holds in mind.
The Essence of All Gardens floats above
The life forms in my garden, newly dug.
I know the Romance of Far-off Places
As I attend the jewels of other climes.
Lilies and peonies and morning glories,
Delphiniums, nasturtiums and redbuds.
Roses, whether tea or floribunda–
Monkshood, bee balm, herbs of ancient times.
The sailing ships that brought these gems from China,
Or Africa or Europe never knew,
That they spread hope and beauty to New Gardens,
So each of us could grow our own small Kew.
June Maginley, May 1991