I recently read an article in which children’s author Julia Donaldson spoke of her sorrow about the new restrictions that the Covid learning environment places upon the singing activity of children. Her grandchildren are being discouraged from singing so that they do not transmit any germs to one another. It evoked within me a deep reflection about how important singing is to our souls. Singing is a universal, ancient aspect of human and animal identity and culture. Singing is a creative act where we are able to explore and express the full range of our feelings. It is a unifying force that connects us to our histories, our ancestors, our hopes and our grief.
To live is to sing and to sing we must have breath. I was suddenly struck by the thematic links involving the breath that are starkly apparent in the illness of our world. The life of George Floyd was ended by a brutal suffocation. As pleaded with his murderer he said the words “I can’t breathe”. Our forests and ecosystems, the source of precious oxygen, are rapidly depleting. This virus Covid is attacking our respiratory capacity. The atmosphere is thick with pollutants from burning fossil fuels.
In a Cartesian world of dualistic dissociation our thinking is guided to compartmentalise these links and thus supports staving off the glare of impending expiration. A holistic perspective, which speaks to the wholeness and interconnectivity of all things, would be capable of holding the possibility that something important can be perceived from allowing these links to have message and meaning. The conceptualisation of the links with breathing as more than merely symbolic could encourage the emergence of a remedial intention.
Singing dirges and devotionals together or singing solo, simply in a reverie of my love affair with life, help me to express my love for our home planet to her. In Te Reo Maori the word Aroha means Love but it can also be understood as a compound word. Aro – is thought, focus, intention and Ha – is life force, energy, breath. Singing with loving intention is a way of breathing a healing energy. What potential does the power and pertinence of singing hold? Can it become a rich source of healing and hope at both local and global levels? Is it capable of supporting a more holistic engagement with our home planet and all her inhabitants?
What were your creative associations to Emmeline’s words?
Cover photo source
What else will be taken from children through the actions of selfish generations? I never dreamed the singing of children specifically would be under threat. Singing represents so much that is human, including resistance movements. I thought of Capoeira, the Afro-Brazilian martial art form, a circle or “Roda” forms around two players and there is call and response singing while a game/fight takes place. It originated when Angolan slaves pretended Capoeira was just a game as they trained under their captives’ noses and some used it to escape to Quilombo communities and live free. Their heroes are immortalised in the songs. Capoeira singing strengthens their descendants' spirits in the face of their on-going oppression.
Actually singing and resistance takes me back to being in a house where parents, aunties and uncles would often break out the Irish Rebel Songs and having singalongs. Our own colonising of Aotearoa disavowed. Rebellion songs are heroic and can eclipse when the story has changed. Sally Weintrobe did talk about the need for transformation of the psyche, not just a change in the people in power.