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Diana Durham is a writer and poet who has been involved in spiritual communities in England, the United States and Canada over the past twenty-five years. Focusing on the power of the spoken word, Diana was a member of the London poetry performance group Angels of Fire, appearing in The Voice Box at the Royal Festival Hall. She is the author of 'The Return of King Arthur: completing the quest for wholeness, inner strength and self-knowledge' and two poetry books: 'To the End of the Night', published by Northwoods Press, Maine as winner of their 2003 annual competition for a book length poetry collection and 'Sea of Glass' published by the Diamond Press, London. Her poetry has featured in numerous journals and anthologies. Mother of two children, she and her family currently reside in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, U.S.A. |
Works by Diana Durham:
King Arthur's Return: Finishing the Quest for Wholeness, Inner Strength, and Self-Knowledge
Diana's new book uses the legends of King Arthur and the quest for the Grail chalice to trace both the individual path to wholeness and what she sees in our times as the emergence of a new paradigm of collective leadership. These two intertwined tales represent the individual and collective stories and the way they interact. The Grail quest is the individual strand, King Arthur and the Round Table is the collective strand.
Read more about King Arthur's Return
Poetry
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To the End of the Night contains all Diana Durham's most significant poems since her previous collection Sea of Glass and is a winner of the Northwoods Press 2003 annual poetry competition. The poems trace on one level the poet's journey from England to America, and a somewhat parallel journey through the deep heart to a place of renewed vision and synthesis of understanding. To the End of the Night is a celebration of the closure of a cycle of darkness, a dedication to the goal of genuine 'enlightenment' and a resting in the promise of the true dark which always brings us to the dawn. |
'Diana Durham's deep clear eye for feeling truth intuits a level
of spiritual reality through the fabric of her poetry that just gets better
and better as time goes on. I have known her since 1989 and her poems
go on reading as fresh as newly-experienced dreams...'
Jay Ramsay - author of 'Kingdom of the Edge - Poems for the Spirit'
and
'Alchemy - the art of transformation', founder of the Chrysalis
Poetry project and poetry editor of 'Kindred Spirit' magazine
'Never having lost her “haze of wonder at the world,”
Diana Durham’s voice “arches [into] unintended prayer”
when her modern-day immigrant eye connects the stark realities of society
with the differently-true fantasies of the psyche. A political, poetic,
and philosophic descendant of Blake, she names the nature and architecture
of places where violence rhymes with benevolence. Here in these poems,
at the end of the night, “thought [is] overtaken / by sensation”
and we must rise at dawn willing to be “taken hostage / by uncertainty.”'
Alice B. Fogel - author of 'I Love This Dark World', recipient
of the NEA
Individual Artists Fellowship
In her poems Diana uses language to do what it alone can pre-eminently do: to chart the invisible, to evoke the realms inside our heads, the perceptions that lie beyond logic and the merely sensory. Yet the poems often set out quite firmly grounded in the natural world:
IN THE STILLNESS
at Nova Nada, a former monastery in Nova Scotia
for Sharonthe blue fade grey
then blue again of evening
blooms between the trees
as if summoned up out of the lake
I lay sleepy awake
inside the warm bare cabin
and each window perfectly
frames a picture
of tree pillars, sloping ground,
falling leaves,
of bronzed water
of what? - the forest home
before we fell asleep -
or a residue of childhood
understanding, the fabric of memory
becoming the way the world is
or was
and time was lost
into the present
stillness of nightfall
the feeling of what the world was like
filled up thick with magic
when all the first things were alive.Night deepened. Inside
there was only propane gas and fire light
fragile candle light
and outside only
the soft light glimmering through windows
and star light.Walking the wide awake night air
the small journey from lodge
back down to log cabin
closer to the waters of the lake
is long enough to traverse
the way of a billion stars
the sky is thick with stars
so many and so clear
that I begin to see
their vertical depths
as well as the patterns they make.Two men are talking, their good nights
lengthening into late night conversation
carried far on the quiet air.
As I wait for their voices to subside
so I can stand in both the stillness
and the silence of the stars
one shoots and falls for me
a golden bow loosened
in the heavens, a sign
an omen of great gladness.The voices carry on in stillness
still as sheltered lake water
stillness from where even the wind rises
and this is found there
a soft immanence waiting in the air
the blue folds of presence
streaming down the cliffs of night
desirous of more than the holy monk's
contemplation
almost you could say
longing
for the circling cup to hold
the fired arrow of his flame.
Review quotes for 'Sea of Glass'
'To convey deep feeling in language that amplifies that feeling on every reading is to go beyond language towards a deeper communication than words can ever convey. The intonation and expression of the poet comes with each stanza, to the extent that the reader absorbs the words as his/her own, that is the gift of the poet. Diana has that gift.'
'Kindred Spirit' magazine
'A lot of energy in this work, waves of it becoming words, shaping these vulnerable and exuberant poems.'
'Poetry Listings'
London
SEA OF GLASS
Sea of glass
mingled with fireheart of an angel
unstained glassflecked with fire
letting light throughpure in heart
veined with lifeblood of Christ
vine of lightangels can do anything
touch is union
at any fathom
of the oceanhearts' fusion
the pure in heart
see God in one anotherholy communion
bread and blood of life
only separation is profane
muddied waters
only stained glass
lead-veined
keeps things apart.
Diana's poems have appeared in numerous magazines in the UK and USA, including
'Orbis', and 'Mankato Review' as well as in three anthologies: 'Earth
Ascending' by Stride; 'Portsmouth Unabridged' by Peter Randall, 'Northwoods
Anthology' by Northwoods Press. One poem formed part of the text of 'Celebration
& Remembrance' an original millenial choral piece by Russsell Grazier
celebrating Portsmouth NH in 2000.
Performance
'A poem is a creative act as well as a patterning of words. It is like a spell of making, which when spoken out loud, changes something. In this sense, the performing/reading of poetry in a grouping of people is dual creation: the 'listening field' is just as important as the spoken words. A poem ought to change something, not just for the poet, but for his or her audience.'
In 1989 Diana joined the well-respected British poetry performance group Angels of Fire and performed with them and solo at many venues in London and throughout the UK, including Pentameters Theatre, the Voice Box, Royal Festival Hall and the Stourbridge Poetry Festival. Founded in 1982, the Angels of Fire aimed to energise poetry through a radical and emotional challenge in performance and above all to make it accessible to their audience.
In collaboration with them Diana also wrote and performed four dramatic monologues as part of a poetic theatre piece directed by actor'director Linda Marlowe (winner of the 1990 Manchester Evening News Best Director Award) and presented at the renowned Kings Head and Latchmere Theatres in London.
Since 1993 Diana and her family have made their home in New Hampshire and as well as performing solo in many venues, including featured poet at the Stone Soup Poets, Cambridge she founded '3 Voices' three women writers who weave their poetry and prose together and who have received state funding and performed state-wide including the Currier Gallery, Manchester and Pontine Movement Theatre, Portsmouth.
Diana has lead poetry performance and writing workshps in a wide variety of venues and for a wide range of ages, including at the Arts Education Institute in Plymouth State College, with seventh graders at Portsmouth Middle School and at the University of New Hampshire Continuing Education Program.
3 Voices
Two poets Diana Durham and Maren Tirabassi and a fiction writer Rebecca
Rule combine their talents in a reading-recital. Not a play, not individual
readings, but an integrated performance of their original work on a theme.
So far they have collaborated on three different programs:
Riding the Moose to Shore - incorporates original music
by Christopher Cote with poetry by Maren and Diana, and a story by Rebecca.
The chant-like meditations and imagery inspired by the patterns of an
ancient, circular stained glass window combine with the dynamic forward
motion of a journey on the sacred waters of Lake Moosilaukee. We meet
a homeless man in touch with aliens, tour the National Cathedral, overhear
women in a coffee shop, and consider the deeper patterns that shape the
human story.
Colours of the Tiger - is a spirited, rhythmic, colorful journey of insight into the human heart, the centrality of art to life, the search for self-expression. The journey takes us many places - from an art gallery to the Glitter Cave of souls to Chichen Itza and Kukulcan; from a prison in New England to the white room of a child's fears and fanatasies; from a funeral to a dream. The vehicle for this journey is the repeated title poem, which, in just fourteen lines, expresses a world of contrast, conflict, and conundrum.
What Lies Beyond - these poems and stories speculate about What lies Beyond and invite listeners to do the same as they explore the universals of the human spirit and belief. Characters welcome you into the kitchen to sit and rest a while, guide you through the gates of a graveyard to contemplate the lives of those who came before, and lead you along a beach in Maine.
A few audience comments from the 1999-2000 season:
"Seamless"
"Rich and Fascinating"
"Unique"
"Over too soon"
Calendar of Events
Poetry Performance:
September 15, Portsmouth, NH: Featured poet at the Press Room's Beat Night, The Press Room, Daniel Street, Portsmouth 8pm
September 22, Exeter, NH: Reading from her new book of poetry 'To the End of the Night'(winner of Northwoods Press 2003 annual poetry competition). Exeter Public Library 7pm
Workshop on Grail & Arthurian myths:
December 16-18, Kripalu Center, Lenox, MA: 'Finding the Grail: using the stories of King Arthur and the Grail Quest and ceremony to attune body, mind and heart with spirit'
Throughout the long dark centuries men and women have longed to find and fulfill the mystery of the Holy Grail, which legend tells us has the power to heal the wounded King and restore the wasteland.
This workshop is a chance to come to understand and embody the meaning and promise of this enigmatic chalice cup that is described in the ancient tales as "made of refined gold and set with precious gems". In the process we will find out why doing this makes a difference to our worlds - begins to restore the wasteland, bringing life to what before was difficult and 'stuck' in our lives.
We will use storytelling, high ceremony and energy work, as well as instructional presentations, journalling, reflection and group discussion to undertake a ritual quest to the center of ourselves, find the Grail, ask the question 'Whom does the Grail serve?' and then make the journey of return to the collective, to the rest of the world, to home.
Participants will be introduced to the fundamentals of Attunement, a non-touch lifestyle and healing practice; and map the circuitary of the Wound - the pattern of emotional addiction in us - and how to reverse it.
For prices and registration see the Kripalu Center website.
Contact
Workshops for students interested in creating their own reading-recitals are also offered and have been received with enthusiasm at middle schools, high schools and teacher conferences.
To book performances or workshops by Diana and/or to order a copy of 'To the End of the Night' or 'Sea of Glass' please email her at: finishingthequest@earthlink.net