William and Dorothy Wordsworth lived at Alfoxton in 1797–8, near their friend Samuel Coleridge, who lived with his family in nearby Nether Stowey. In that year each of them wrote some of their finest work – the volume of poems called Lyrical Ballads, including ‘The Rime of the Ancyent Mariner’, and ‘Tintern Abbey’, as well as Dorothy’s ‘Alfoxden Journal’. 

This retreat, led by Dhivan and Vishvapani, will combine meditation with reading and exploring poetry, doing some writing, walking in the Quantocks in the footsteps of the poets, and generally reliving the spirit of English Romanticism (but without any laudanum).

11th – 17th September 2023

We are laid asleep

In body and become a living soul

While an eye made quiet by the power

Of harmony and the deep power of joy

We see into the life of things