Rosemary Jefford

Threshold is a multi-dimensional artwork using poetry, music and sculpture exploring loss and shared memory. The project initiated by Rosemary who collaborated with the artist Anna Walker to create an experiential exhibition of poetry and music written and composed by Rosemary with the sculpture created by Anna.

Rosemary had been seeking a collaboration that explored memory and time, using multi-dimensionality. The theme of the work revealed itself through a conversation between Rosemary and Anna where they discussed losing someone in life and the 'threshold' moment when you realise the shared memory you held together can only now be carried by you.

Threshold has been created to spend a few moments in the present to look back and be reminded of that person through Rosemary's poetry and music and Anna's sculpture which is a space created to sit alone whilst reflecting on your own shared rememberings. What happens to shared memory that exists in the past, in the present and perhaps in the future? Where does it go? How do we move through time - past present and future to make sense of loss with its often sudden and sharp arrival?

The Guildford Festival of the Arts:

https://www.guildfordfestivalofthearts.co.uk/

The Lighthouse

191 High Street

Guildford

GU1 3AW

Thursday 1st October - Sunday 4th October

11am - 4pm each day

Entry: Free

Rosemary's music inside the sculpture is designed to be listened to by one person at a time. It is three minutes long and can be accessed either by QR code from your phone and your own headphones, or by the MP3 player and headphones provided. Please leave the MP3 Player and headphones for others to enjoy the music.

Threshold
Unmasked, on soft knees, plain
memory cast in shadow-light;
don’t look back, I’m looking back;
how do I not look back?

To gather all that we were
hold our moments as a small bird,
cradled out of time
so time can have no part in us,
you, who left – I - who is left.

Erase time - dissolve it, burn it
scatter it over the ocean of our one held life.
I stumble on without you, naked in a north wind,
you were the compass I steered by –
you are the shadow-compass I cannot find.

Who pushes me through the door under this dark lintel?
I am standing in a room, a scent unknown -
would my choosing make its fragrance any sweeter?

What animal of adventure is this, loping through memories
making its home where one day I might light a candle –
stand alone in its soft light
allowing us to be a flicker, now and then.

So swim in me, time, one pull after another
until day takes hold of day
night returns to night
sharing the skies in umbral light
ebbing and flowing
as I yield to a tomorrow.