Between the Sea & Me: A Grief and Gratitude Ritual for the Coastal Maine Community [SOLD OUT]

A community gathering with a series of workshops, rituals, and performances organized by regenerative artistic training company Hogfish. Centered around the January storms and climate grief, but open to all. With performances by Palaver Strings, Castlebay, and other musical artists. Beverages and sea snacks to follow courtesy of Atlantic Sea Farms and Bangs Island Mussels. Proceeds go to benefit the Island Institute’s Storm Response.

Hogfish is deeply honored to hold an empathetic, safe, and nurturing space for grieving, gratitude, and community. Grief and gratitude are not meant to be solitary, though today many of us grieve and give thanks alone; communal ritual offers the opportunity to witness one another’s pain and joy, share our stories of heartbreak and heart-made, and to hold each other as we journey into the depth of our collective sorrow so that we may more fully experience the joy of being alive and connected to each other and the natural world. 

This event will include:

• poetry and song
• an invocation to the unseen world through spoken word and drumming
• time to grieve and have that grieving witnessed and held
• grounding practices to help us find deep support as we unwind and soften the bracing in our bodies
• the creation of a beautiful shrine
• micro-rituals of guided writing practices that include an opportunity to share and witness in small groups
• gentle somatic movement practices
• culminating in a powerful community grief ritual.

Robin Wall Kimmerer writes, “If grief can be a doorway to love, then let us all weep for the world we are breaking apart so we can love it back to wholeness again.’”   

Please plan to bring any items you’d like to include on our grief and gratitude shrine. Photos, stones, flowers, art, and any meaningful objects which either represent a thread of grief or gratitude that you carry or objects that support you to welcome grief or gratitude — all are welcome. You will take these items home with you. We invite you to bring a short poem to share, a journal and pen for our writing micro-ritual, a reusable travel mug or water bottle for liquids, and whatever you might need or want to be comfortable. We suggest wearing layered, comfortable clothes. The venue has chairs, benches, and cushions, though you may wish to bring your own backjack, kneeling cushion, etc.

The climate is changing. Temperatures and tensions are rising in our environment, our communities, and ourselves. Industrialization and the digital world have lifted billions out of poverty, and yet, with the rise of wealth has also come the rise of inequality, toxic carbon levels, fraught public discourse, and sedentary lifestyles. Hogfish is inspired by heroes, sung and unsung, working to restore wellness to global, social, and personal realms. 

Hogfish believes that applying the principles of regenerative agriculture to the arts provides a unique opportunity to holistically restore every layer of the human experience. We are on a quest to build an artistic sanctuary and body of work to restore a healthier dynamic balance between our planet, the stories we tell, and the way we live. www.hogfish.org

Carl Austin Hyatt – Invocation and Ritual Leader
Carl Austin Hyatt is a photographer whose work is in major museum collections including the Museum of Fine Arts Boston and the Smithsonian Museum. Hyatt was a MacDowell Fellow and sits on the National Parks Arts Foundation Advisory Board. The artist has a profile of his work in the current issue of Artscope Magazine and two concurrent exhibitions in Maine; one at the Van Ward Gallery in Cliff House Maine and another at the Gallery in the Press Hotel, both up through the end of March. For thirty years the artist has been studying shamanic practices in North America, South America and Africa. He found his spiritual home in the high Andes of Peru where he has traveled more than thirty five times where he has been facilitating corporate retreats, workshops and pilgrimages for twenty years.

Sarah Mays-Sutor – Art Therapy Station Leader
Sarah Mays-Sutor is a Registered, Board Certified Art Therapist, a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, and a Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor. With over fifteen years of clinical experience in various settings throughout New York City and Southern Maine, Sarah currently meets with adults for outpatient therapy at her office in Portland. Specializations include substance use issues, life transitions, anxiety, depression, grief, positive patenting techniques, and postpartum issues.

Sarah Goodwin – Journaling Station Leader
Sarah is a National Board Certified Health and Wellness Coach (NBC-HWC), trained at Duke Health & Well-Being. Her private practice, Goodwin Health Coaching is based in South Portland, though she works with clients in Maine and beyond. Sarah lends her coaching skills to Hogfish as a wellness consultant. Being a health coach allows Sarah to live true to her ideals while supporting others in their journey toward wholeness, with compassion and empathy. Spending time in the garden with her husband and three pups is Sarah’s favorite wellness practice. Sarah’s core values are creativity, gratitude, honesty, kindness, loyalty, and wisdom.

Lucy Dhegrae – Electronic Music, Performer, Ritual Leader
Lucy Dhegrae (vocalist/electronic composer) was trained in Grief Ritual Leadership by Francis Weller (The Wild Edge of Sorrow). From Lansing, Michigan, she now lives in New York City and previously ran an international vocal music festival, Resonant Bodies, and sang contemporary vocal music in both Europe and America. In summer ’22 she first worked with Hogfish’s production of The Magic Tree, and again in summer ’23 was resident DJ and electronic composer for their production of CarmXn in downtown Portland. Additionally, she is a public speaker with the Rape and Incest National Network (RAINN) and has produces trauma-informed work. She sees grief rituals and dance parties as twin mediums. www.soundcloud.com/xnr-g

Matt Cahill – Somatic Station Leader & Performer
Matt Cahill is the co-founder and director of Hogfish along with his husband Edwin. Together, and through Hogfish, they are creating the regenerative arts – new secular rituals for the modern human that restore our relationship to the living world. Mind to Body. Performer to Audience. Individual to Community. Human to Nature. Matt directs the artist residency at Hogfish, and is a Juilliard trained performer and teacher of performers at the Metropolitan Opera, Circle in the Square Theatre School, and privately in Maine and New York City. He specializes in mind-body awareness for singer-actors, and is an AmSAT certified teacher of the Alexander Technique and Reiki Level II Healer.

This gathering embraces you as you are, without expectations on how you express grief and gratitude. Both are not summoned at will. We offer respect, not unsolicited advice. Bring your humanity and willingness to bear witness with compassion. Your feelings —whether of active grief or gratitude, tears, outrage, numbness, awkwardness, or trepidation—are accepted without reservation. This ritual is centered around our grief for the recent coastline destruction and gratitude for what we had and what remains, but all grief and gratitude are welcome and, of course, as we open one connection, often others will come to the surface. We hope to provide a space where all grief and gratitude are held. 

This event is designed for participants 15 years of age and older. Out of respect for the ritual space, there will be no entry after 3:30 pm. We encourage early arrival to prepare and be in the space.

All proceeds go to the Island Institute in support of their work to heal the damage to the Maine island and coastal communities from the storms of January 10 and 13.

“Something is stirring in the depths of the times. Our collective denial appears to be cracking. We can no longer deny the fact that the world is radically changing. We sense in our bones the breakdowns occurring and, along with it, our hearts feel weighted with grief. It may be our shared sorrows, stirred by our love of this singular, irreplaceable planet, that will ultimately activate our communal commitment to respond to the rampant denigration of the world.” – Francis Weller, The Wild Edge of Sorrow