April 2025: Incest Survivor’s Roar update and oak tree sit-spot project

Synchronicities abounded as I prioritized my Incest Survivor’s Roar plan (using the arts and sylvotherapy to aid self-exploration, expression, empowerment and interconnection for incest survivors in a more incest-aware world): I came across the book, ‘Women’s Voices in Experiential Education’ by Karen Warren with an entire chapter in it about the pros and cons of working outdoors in nature with incest survivors. Then I met Christina - a social entrepreneur, fellow incest survivor and idealist.org volunteer, who was really excited about my proposal, which she said is much-needed given that 87 % of youth offenders in America were sexually abused by a relative. She also liked the name of this potential service-based social enterprise / non-profit. We were both enlivened by our conversation: she suggested that I instigate the first Incest Awareness Month, that I could create a garden in which the flowers represent survivors, and I could partner with domestic abuse shelters and do talks in youth detention centres. Given that this world is set up to deny or hide unpalatable truths, however, I’m going to need people in my corner who share my vision. I told my distant mentor, Rhonda Britten about this and she replied, “That’s such a beautiful and brave step - congrats on honouring that whisper in your heart! Starting something rooted in service is powerful work, and I’m cheering you on as you bring your vision to life.”

I loved the book, ‘Nature-Based Expressive Arts Therapy: Integrating the Expressive Arts and Ecotherapy’ by Sally Atkins and Melia Snyder: my life’s work as an artist has been evolving into this practice without my being aware of it.

For 19 days I’ve been doing my ‘oak tree sit-spot’ challenge after selecting a senior oak tree in Claybury Park, Ilford to sit beside or under most days over the duration of a year to see what I notice and feel: sit-spotting is a way of engaging the senses to connect with nature, foster awareness, and improve well-being. Anywhere in nature will do; indeed when I haven’t been able to get into the woods, some days I sit quietly in my garden for 10 minutes.

Check out my ‘Sylvotherapy’ playlist on YouTube for more information: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLk99iJ6gY68gjbstO3S-q67eN605h7oga&si=9JLMKtgcvZje3aBm and here are the April / May 2025 journal entries of my findings:

Cold. Early morning. What's the difference between a crow and a raven? Upset and overwhelmed on the way to the oak. Found my usual hollow / crevice at the base of the tree trunk to lean up against with my backpack as support - like one's favourite chair. Ravens are bigger than crows with a wedge-shaped tail. I see a shiny, jet black, graceful one with a wingspan that reminds me of Batman. The way through my day becomes clearer. A great tit settles on a thin branch in the same place I saw one last time. Wind stirs the hands of pliable like warm plastic leaves of the canopy. I could sit on a chair but then I wouldn't have the connection with the ground. It taking time for the 'phone effect' to wear off. A woodlouse with antennae the shape of clothes hooks drops from the tree onto my page. Rich, dark soil: the smell of leaf mold. Familiar dog walking lady with bobbed grey hair and glasses. I don’t bother getting all of my gear out today. More woodpecker holes noticed towards the treetop. Grey squirrel twirls like a gymnast on a high bar my gaze then follows along to its drey just above a forked branch. Magpies in the middleground. The network of twigs leading off branches remind me of the veins in my heart. Falling leaves move like small birds. I let my thoughts and feelings glide like a crow. A small brown caterpillar falls from above and lands on my jacket. It has a line of cream vertical stitches along its spine. Its legs are so delicate I can barely feel them on my skin. The cold seeps into my bones from below. I open Mary Oliver's book, 'Felicity' at her poem, 'Leaves and Blossoms Along the Way'. It feels very apt for today.

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Tearful on arrival just before midday. Nothing but my sweater between my back and the knarly tree trunk. Tiny red/orange spider on my trousers spinning at the end of its silk. I close my eyes and listen to birdsong near and far as reds, creams and blacks flicker on the insides of my eyelids. Then two park police on a mission intrude on my reverie. A luminous lime green caterpillar with stumpy legs inches up my arm and rears up on meeting my finger. It enjoys playing. I am joined by other insects and revere the cathedral of leaves above me. I wish I could disappear into the tree. Being bitten. Not as busy as first thing in the morning: tiny birds in thin branches chatting amongst themselves. Sick of seeing peoples' heads appearing. I make a ball with spit and soil from the foot of my oak, roll it in my hand, speak my dreams out loud and bury it. Birds get louder as I start playing a violin improvisation dedicated to Zara Aleena. Oak dirt on my fingertips which dusts the fiddle fingerboard. I imagine murdered Zara's anger and it comes alive in my playing. I hold my violin up to let the wind blow through it. In putting my ear to a sound hole I hear a whole string orchestra tuning up inside it.

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A dull, still early morning that feels ultra relaxing. A raven lands on a scrawny understory tree top covered in buds opposite me, then glides to the right down into the woods as if showing off its magnificence. A single magpie, which doesn’t represent sorrow to me. A multitude of tiny holes in the charred section of the trunk made by ants, bark beetles? Instinctively I brought out my Falcon guitar to express in music my gratitude to the oak and to see if any answers would come to me as to where I could busk: somewhere quiet and cool first thing? The usual dog walking lady whose large dog is a dark orangey brown. My back itches intensely despite my atlas cedar wood oil on a rag deterrent. Dried up catkins drop onto my DD magic carpet. Leaf clusters the shape of clouds. A whiff of dog shit. Grass taller; surrounding bramble bushes thicker. I take my eyes off a grey squirrel and it vanishes. Gifts of husks land on the white page of my journal and a rough-feeling ribbon of bark that let slits of light through it clunks next to me. I am sat under a dome. It’s not freezing but it’s not warm. In walking here I mulled over and consolidated ideas for Incest Survivor's Roar. Surround sound birdsong. Silhouettes of small birds land on small trees with sketchy branches. More of the trees have leaves on. I plead with the insects to stop biting me in future.

[Garden]: I close my eyes and listen... something steps on my DD magic carpet: the orange kitten has come to join me for a game and is trying to get underneath it. A wasp hovers over a potted gooseberry bush like a tiny drone. Next door's white (not so pink) apple blossom. I play with the kitten who bats the biro out of my hand then pounces on it: a welcome distraction.

Early morning. I find a muddy, empty glass bottle of Magnum Tonic Wine - Original Jamaican Recipe in the tall grass beneath the outer circle of the oak's crown of branches. To avoid getting bitten, I sit near the tree on a patch of grass opposite the rising sun. The oak looks stunning; its grey / brown bark reminds me of the texture of the Earth's crust. A garish green piece of rubbish wrapped around one of the thick branches. I enjoy a different view with my back to dog walkers. Itchy hairline. Woodlice. No frost underneath the oak like there is on the surrounding grassland. A (great tit)? chick flies into a pale, oval compartmented hole near the elbow of a branch. Bark missing from around the entrance of it. More babies flit in and out, pausing to pick and flick at leaf clusters on the other side of the tree. All the trees nearby in leaf now so the oak is more enclosed. I look up into a kaleidoscope of leaves, feeling a lot less anxious. The sun shining through their viridescence makes them a shade lighter. It’s hard to imagine this oak having been here way, way before I was born. My eyes still over-stimulated from screen time; not able to sink into seeing less surface things.

Around 7.30 am. Dry, mainly still, and blue sky. Very cold. I sit almost directly under the great tit nest with little ones coming and going. Does the oak and its community want me here? I need eyes all over my head to see all that there is to be seen. Loud, gossipy birdsong. A grey squirrel washing itself on a branch 50 degrees up from the ground. It feels like I’m in church. Red flash of a robin's breast among the mess of brown twigs on the forest floor. A mixture of bird sounds. A dead medium-sized branch sticks out the side of a main branch like an elephant's tusk. Myself and the tree inside a vintage glass paperweight. My upset dissipates. A tightrope of spider silk glints way up the tree. Burnt bannock on my tongue. A pair of robins in my eyeline. A bluey bird flaps it's wings, suspended in place. Three parakeets dive down and away from the oak in a triangle formation. The hum of planes and traffic a reminder that the capitalist machine perpetually awaits. A magpie takes off from within the tree's fenced boundary for a change, then alights on the neighbouring oak.

7.04 am. Air soupy with fog. A haze of bright white where the sun usually sits in the tree next door. Monochrome oak. Hands of outer leaves emerge the nearer I get. A pair of robins to my right in the same area as they were two days ago, swapping between low twigs. I feel simultaneously sweaty and damp. On the way here through the woods I witnessed a very large hopping hare-type creature bolting up Hospital Hill away from a small caramel-coloured scruffy dog. Baby great tits at work to-ing and fro-ing from their nest near to where a dead catkin spins down onto the floor. My glasses steam up. Atmosphere of cloudy marble. I water down Irish milk powder for my tea. The clear ground features a combination of long, drying out grass, catkin crumble and dead leaves breaking up. A tiny pale orange spider navigating the folds of my magic carpet. Trees in the foreground slowly coming into view. I wonder if it’s too wet to get my viola out. A shrub with a bramble backing just under the tree the ideal location for an overnight bivvy camp. Great tit chicks the size of oak leaves explore the crown of the oak more. Thick branches block my view of a parakeet in flight. Slimmer branches bounce under the weight of indistinct animals. Birdsong amps up as I start playing my viola (for the first time, barefoot in the forest). Geese fly over honking just before my departure.

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7.31 am. Warmer. Sitting in a dip surrounded by long, luscious grass on the opposite side of the tree to where I've been positioned for the past while. The shadow of my hand and pen writing on sunlit white paper. More hovering insects. Spilt tea between my legs. I want to be able to identify the different birdsongs that are now becoming familiar to me on my early morning visits. Most of them originate from the oak tree that's been slow to leaf beyond this one. Bushy foliage everywhere. Closer to the trunk, looking up into the brightest quarter of the oak canopy. A circular scar in the trunk like a badge of the beaming sun where a branch has been sawn off, containing multiple straight grooves emanating from its centre, bisecting growth rings. I lay on my back, tracing the limbs that have made their crooked way towards blue heaven where bugs dance in an out of each others' orbits. The shadow of a crow (?), wings spread, crosses the trunk. Specs of leaf in my tea. Very peaceful. An ecstatic bird expertly dodges the oak's branches before swooping then plunging into the wood. Giant grass blade shadows on my page.

8.19 am. I'm glad I said hello to the tree before setting up on the grassland near its hushed, commanding presence. Traffic noise louder than normal. A magpie in front of me walks / hops among clumps of dewy grass, inspecting the scene. The aroma of fresh grass and sunscreen. Harsh sun burns the right side of my face. A great tit feeds beneath twigs of a tender oak. Sitting apart from the tree, I no longer feel a part of its community. My oak tree is the shape of a large broccoli floret. Feeling too hot, I move. It’s comforting having the oak where I can see it from the grove in which I doze in my hammock.

1.33 pm. Too hot for me. A lot less birdsong. Dried out catkins, twiglets, dust, seeds and shells rain down from the oak continuously; harder with each wind flurry, and lodge in my hair. Tired after a stressful tent camp and I need to get home. Three quarters of the tree canopy shiny with sun. Great tit nest still very much in use. The stalk of a dead catkin with a spongy green ball speckled with red on the end of it, like an apple embryo.

Incest Survivor's Roar, SylvotherapyGemma Boyd: Musician, Writer and ArtistMay 5, 2025Incest Survivor's Roar, Gem in the Mud YouTube, oak tree sit-spot, sylvotherapy, sit-spotting, sylvotherapist, nature-based expressive arts therapyComment