sanctuaries in wales

“My pen is not able to set forth
the solemn quiet awe, the calm,
serene state of mind that I enjoyed
for many days, so that it seemed
that I had gotten into another world.”

~ Memoirs and Journal of Hugh Judge, 18th century Quaker

We may well consider that moving through hours and days, connecting locations and occasions by our paths, a voyage of distances and way-stations has long been in progress. We need only to realize. There is a natural longing for safe havens, and these manifest in as many ways as we are individuals. Viewing the whole of living as a continuous pilgrimage, sanctuary may be found as easily in a café as in a cathedral. Opening my journal to write, during a hillside intermezzo, the book itself represented a shelter of worded thoughts. Pages already inscribed enshrine sanctified ideas and impressions. The subsequent blank pages to follow are as lands yet untracked. The recording of moments resides in the liminal, with freshly written lines shining back available light. Though not always conscious of our searches for places of tranquility, they are surely recognizable in our unguarded wonder.

Hardly able to believe I had reached the Pilgrims' Way- and North Wales- I made sure to do this.

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Above two images and sculpted icon below: Saint David's Cathedral, Cardiff.

By definition, one may well think of high altars, congregational solemnities and ritual celebrations, but in general sanctuaries include places of refuge as well. Where refuge is found, tranquility, safety, and respite are discovered; these represent oases from such forces as those which exhaust and endanger the soul. Over the years, I’ve learned to seek out such locations and situations; they are vital and necessary. Sanctuaries are places conducive to strengthening, pointing wayfarers to reminders of God, of consolation, of the value in the voyage.

Above: Bible Garden, near Bangor Cathedral
Below: Bangor University Chapel.

A sanctuary may be perceived as something pulling the traveller off the road and interrupting progress. It may look to all the world like unproductive destinations, but indeed, I draw needed inspiration to retake the road undauntedly. Fresh starts are crucial, however they are tried in fresh continuances. Beginnings have their references in my continuum of terra cognita, but my journey’s end ever remains unknown to me. What I can and must do, is to hold the wise course of living faith.

Penmaenmawr




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Above: The small chapel at right was used by the BBC for Dylan Thomas to broadcast his poems and essays, just far enough away from the bombings of Swansea harbor during World War II.

Life as an ongoing pilgrimage of trust provides context as I string together nurturing venues amidst the constancy of transition. It is a process of learning and growth. Times of retreat provide for places of strengthening, sending me into the stream again, so that I can face the world newly intact. With a mindset of sanctuary, large and unfamiliar spaces can become intimate, with reminders of the Holy Spirit’s presence.

Recently, while travelling by train, I looked up from my writing and coffee to look around at my environs. Passengers with their belongings, and rolling scenery through the windows, brought to mind how the train itself was a sheltering passage toward future places. Returning to the view from my window, my thoughts turned to what I call “discovered sanctuary,” which is how I describe the realization of being in a peaceful place- when sanctuary is found incidentally. Then, turning back to my journal, the book itself reminded me of its own intrinsic properties as a portable refuge.

Caernarfon Castle. The photo below is the site of the castle's chapel.

In Wales, my experience was very much an incidental succession of sanctuaries, no matter where I travelled- indoors and outdoors alike. My steps crossed thresholds of holy places, paths, and homes. Each encounter was wrapped around a sincere welcome, and I was sure to express my appreciation. My seatmate on a train in North Wales happened to be from the Isle of Anglesey. I asked him what his favorite peaceful place was, and he replied with the 6th century Penmon Priory; he described the “quiet presence” there, and how much he loves to walk the grounds. I followed his advice, grateful that I’d asked.

Penmon Priory, Isle of Anglesey. Yes, I was really there.

The hospitable openness to converse, which I found everywhere, brought my steps to sacred sites I may not have easily found. Fellow pilgrims I met along the way pointed out where I could find stone circles and cairns.

Ancient cairns, Carmarthenshire.



Circle of standing stones, Bangor.



Circle of standing stones, Cardiff.

While in Swansea, I was told not to miss the colorfully-decorated Saint Teilo’s Church, north of Cardiff and Llandaff. The plain exterior offers no hint as to the brilliant frescoes that are inside.

Saint Teilo's Church :

In Cardiff, my curiosity to see the 200-year-old Tabernacl Caerdydd found the doors open to this extraordinary and majestic Baptist chapel. I’d learned just enough Welsh for salutations, and the congregants and ministers graciously regaled me in English; the associate pastor told me about how he had been to Maine. The downtown Welsh-speaking church had been the parish of the famous preacher Christmas Evans. Standing near the historic pulpit, I looked toward stained glass illustrations of the spiritual graces.

Cardiff Tabernacle

An enduring memory occurred during the deep silence of worship at the Quaker Meeting House in Bangor. As the community settled into the customary waiting upon the Holy Spirit, a tremendous rain fell upon the skylights and windows, pelting with sublime and persistent percussion upon the whole town while we were warmly sheltered inside the sanctuary. Each place I visited left profound impressions that remain with me.

Above: Quaker Meeting House, Bangor.
Below: Quaker Meeting House, Cardiff.







Above: Sign of peace, in English and Welsh, Quaker Meeting House, Cardiff.
Below: Cardiff Synagogue. The inscription is Isaiah 56:7.

While dining in a small streetcorner bistro, a glance about the place once more brought the idea of safe harbor to mind. Not unlike the train and the chapel, the quietly humming eatery was serving as a sheltering hearth. Momentarily setting down knife, fork, and pencil, I heard the dulcet chimes of porcelain, teacups, and glasses mixed with a din of soft voices. As with most sanctuaries, this was a place of temporary recess for those who had arrived and will press forward en route to subsequent places. Waystations have the inherent property of being short-term habitations. Perhaps your own discovered sanctuaries come to mind, as you ponder this. And common to the sanctuaries I’ve found is the stilling message of perseverance.

Penmon, Isle of Anglesey.

good companion

“Don’t be too harsh to these poems
until they’re typed.
I always think typescript
lends some sort of certainty:
at least if the things are bad
then, they appear to be bad with conviction.”

~ Dylan Thomas

Being entrusted with the Dylan Thomas birthplace and family home for a week was both a profound honor and a matter of great comfort. I felt entirely at home. It had been made very clear to me by my hosts that I could open, sit on, cook with, and operate anything in the house. But making myself at home means doing things with care and reverence. Obviously, all the furnishings and decorations are antiques. I marveled at how the chairs, sofa, clocks, and tables must have greeted an extraordinary variety of visitors. As a gracious guest, I ate and sipped from well-loved plates and cups. An old travel habit of mine is to always bring along a small radio; in a rather lifelike manner, a radio will adapt to its environs and receive only its most proximate signals. Though incongruent with the 1900s-era house, I discreetly placed the little set on the Thomas dining table, tuned to Radio Wales. After all, the present visits the past which greets the moment.

My wanderings in the plain yet unusual house inevitably led to finding some favorite perches. From outside, the house resembles the other contiguous row houses. The home’s distinction is found within; it was clear that Number Five has a kind of soul, one that welcomes and approves of inhabitants being at ease- and writing. On my initial explorations of the small rooms, I was immediately captivated by the typewriter on the desk in the family study.

This Imperial Good Companion sounded through the working days of the elder D.J. Thomas, schoolmaster, and his celebrated son and one of the world’s great poets- Dylan Thomas. Along with everything else in the house, the old typewriter was unlocked and just as casually accessible as the shelved books, the spindled gramophone records, and the hutched dinner plates. At first, in my respectful deference, I’d write next to the tools on the desk, with my typewriter next to Dylan’s and using my fountain pen next to his ink stand. Being a guest in the house, it was already a great gift to inhabit the space and write at the desk.

At first, I typed alongside the Good Companion.
The Splendid and The Good Companion : how salubrious!

But my hospitable and trusting host encouraged me to live in the house, and not simply inhabit the rooms. Arriving one morning with the first of my reading audiences, the house’s curator could hear my typing from the outside front path, and entered exclaiming, “what a perfectly wonderful sound!” It may have been very many years since sounding streams of typed words had filled the front rooms. The following day, returning to the desk, I tried writing on the Good Companion. Compared to my 1960s Olympia, the antique machine seemed raw and tinny- but it worked just fine, albeit through a dry ribbon. Remembering that I had packed an extra typewriter ribbon for my journey, I ran up the sets of steep steps to my suitcase. But before making the dash, standing up from the old typewriter, I habitually patted it with a “be right back.” After a thumb-blackening respooling of my spare new ribbon onto the old metal Imperial hubs, I began writing with the Good Companion.

The Good Companion writes again (note ribbon wrappings at left). Test example in photo below.









After switching to Dylan's typewriter, I set aside my fountain pen, in favor of his ink stand and dip pens. Indeed, I was well at home!

Picking up speed, I developed a feel for the uncalibrated roller-advance and the way typed letters strike at the top of the platen facing upward, compared to the more modern orientation of typebars striking at the operator’s side of the roller- facing the typist. The bell had an egg-timer’s chime. Typing journal entries and a few letters to mail, I thought of D.J. Thomas, Dylan Thomas, sounds of words, forms of words, and aromas of rained-upon slate surfaces through the open windows. Through the day, my unscrapably inked thumbs and index fingers were writer’s emblems in a great Welsh city of writers.

The Uplands section of Swansea, Wales.

The Uplands neighborhood of Swansea has the ambience of a compact, self-sufficient hilltop village within a metropolis. Surely, the city has its own distinctive character, though I recognized glimpses of old familiar places in Portland and Boston among the steep terrain and bay views from even the humblest buildings. Meandering streets wind out of an artery called Uplands Terrace and collect at Gwydr Square.

Views of shops on the Square, with a noble bakery red dragon (above), and the newsagent's (below).





Above: the view toward Cwmdonkin Drive (Dylan's street) from the Gower Kitchen pub. Below: shops along Uplands Terrace.





Harrison's of Swansea : best stationer in town, and the proprietors are as fabulous as the goods they sell.

At the square which converges several roads are shops, eateries, and pubs- essentials which include bakeries, second-hand shops, a bookstore, a grocer, and Swansea’s best stationer: Harrison’s. One morning, after mailing letters into a slot in a stone wall, procuring bread at Davies, and cheese at Sainsbury’s, I stopped in at Harrison’s. The best errand saved for last was an enduring reward, as Mr Werrett the shopkeeper found a beautiful British-made unlined journal for me- which I purchased- along with a supply of rich blue-black ink, Derwent pencils, and Gillott pen points (all British made). In our very pleasant chat, we talked shop, comparing notes about the materials we use to practice our crafts. It was heartening to hear the Joseph Gillott company is still producing; I’ve been writing with their pen points since I first took up calligraphy when I was twelve. Mr. Werrett kindly packed the blank hardcovered journal well for my long journey back to Maine. We wished each other a good summer, and I climbed the curved streets back up to Dylan’s house.

Re-outfitted to continue exploring and writing, breaks in the weather opened the ways for journeying to southwestern Wales. With Dylan’s house as a home-base, it was as enjoyable to be indoors as outdoors, and surely the spirited Good Companion was never far away.

Below: writing in Dylan's childhood room.












Gower Peninsula