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Gwanwyn Festival 2014

Published: 27/05/2014

Older people in Flintshire have inspired a community poet to write a poem for a nationwide celebration of creativity for over 55s. The Gwanwyn Festival is a series of events held across Wales during May offering opportunities for greater participation by older people in the arts. Poet Sophie McKeand has written the poem Llif / Flow to reflect Holywell and the older people that live there as well as ebbs and courses from ideas that pool like St Winefride’s Well. It was created during workshops held in Holywell Library with Holywell’s Community Archive Group and two Adult Learner’s groups who studied poetry as part of the festival. Llif / Flow will be performed at a poetry reading, open to the public in Holywell Library on Friday 6 June at 1pm, together with poems crafted by residents from Llys Eleanor in Shotton. The Shotton group have attended workshops to express in poetry and prose how birds transform our lives looking at verse by Wallace Stevens, Gweneth Lewis and WB Yeats before finding their own voices and creating poems. After the performance, these pieces will be on display in Holywell Library. This part of the Gwanwyn project has been devised and coordinated by the Arts, Culture and Events Section of Flintshire County Council and is funded by the Gwanwyn Festival/Age Concern and by Flintshire County Council. Anyone who would like to attend the readings or who is curious about community poetry can contact Beth Ditson, Community Events Officer on 07786 523 601 for more information. Photo caption: Community poet Sophie McKeand who will perform on 6 June at Holywell Library.