Nature: no resistancePoetry collection review … harmony in surrender to the cycles of life and death ...
Right from the first poem, “Bathing Beauty” – about a heron – Gaya Hammadriya uses evocative and emotive imagery in her 2025 poetry collection Wanderer Between Worlds. The 36 poems are about nature, inspired by her photo-nature walks taken each day at dawn. Good Energy Portals: Poetry & Photography Volume 1: Wanderer Between Worlds is primarily about trees – watching us as much as we are watching them. Gaya’s poems are contemplative and elegantly simple. She uses striking imagery and avoids overt sentimentality, letting nature’s quiet transformations speak for themselves. In a meditative mood, the author takes a Zen-like approach to the seasonal cycle of nature – beginnings, endings, transformations, and renewals. For example, in the poem “Meditation on the Birch and the Fungi” the tree is personified as a storyteller lining its bark with the “calligraphy of time” – a living manuscript of the elements. The fungi, at the base of an old birch, “bloom in soft, layered steps, like footsteps of renewal” which demonstrates a gentle dynamism as if each layer of fungi marks the tree surrendering itself to time. As the birch dies, the fungi do not mourn – instead they turn memory into vibrancy, the past into presence. The tree does not resist. This perspective of death and renewal is one of celebration not melancholy. The message throughout the collection is – no fear, no resistance – not clinging to the past but surrendering it harmoniously. There is something deeply Zen-like in the author’s idea that nature does not grieve change but embraces it as a vital part of its rhythm of life. A meditation on acceptance. There are no forced rhymes or strict metric structures, just the mimic of a slow, mindful meditation. The poems repeat the motifs of transformation - turning, becoming, giving – these words weaving through the poetry lines. As the collection ends, the closing lines provide a satisfying resolution as the poems, like nature, become one, not in losing themselves but in reframing the act of unity as they dissolve into the soil. While the poems embrace neutrality and acceptance, they stop short of expanding the emotional palette – no struggle, only surrender. The poems are also heavily visual and stop short of total sensory immersion – no scent, no touch, no sound. This poetry collection is philosophical, soothing, graceful, and deeply rooted in nature, offering a fresh perspective on the impermanence of life. It is a beautifully presented and crafted collection of insightful poems and photographs, that could push the sensory depth further into the forest.
Photographs: from Good Energy Portals: Poetry & Photography Volume 1: Wanderer Between Worlds (2025): Gaya Hammadriya. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. Can’t see the whole article? Want to view the original article? Want to view more articles? Go to Martina’s Substack: The Stories in You and Me You're currently a free subscriber to The Stories in You and Me . For the full experience, upgrade your subscription.
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