Jennie Beth Banks

  “Grief Lines” 

Card & Paper Art & Poetry

Grief can be experienced in myriads of different ways. And not all bad. Just different forms on different days and different shapes in different ways. 

Have we been ‘taught’ or ‘conditioned’ to ‘deal’ with our grief in certain ways, in this generation and in our society? 

‘What IF’ there were other ways to be with our grief? 

  Read Accompanying Poem Below:

“WHAT IF”

What if I wasn’t meant to fight my grief?

What if I was meant to feel my grief?

What if I wasn’t meant to move on from my grief?

What if I was meant to keep my grief moving, changing, transforming?

What if I wasn’t meant to get frustrated that grief appeared again today and how it’s getting in the way of my everyday life and all the things I need to do?

What if grief is here to teach me to slow down, to notice things, to consider more deeply, to appreciate more, to smile. What if grieving is what I need to do?

What if I wasn’t meant to be here in this moment letting go of my grief, and leaving this gathering without it?

What if I was meant to be here in this moment to shine a light on my grief, so that me and my grief leave here happily together….so that I leave this gathering holding my grief, tending it, acknowledging it.

What if I wasn’t meant to stop feeling all the regrets I didn’t share or resolve with my loved one?

What if I was supposed to now start feeling all of those, so that my relationships with all my other loved ones can improve?

What if I wasn’t supposed to be having an isolated grief experience as a human being?

What if I was meant to be embracing the realitythat all human beings experience this and letting that realization change me and shape me?

What if I wasn’t meant to grief alone, sat in my house, carrying all of these new emotions in my body?

What if I was meant to grief in community, with others, alongside others, recognizing and mirroring the emotions we all carry, the experiences we all share?

What if I wasn’t meant to figure out the complex emotions that grief has left me with? What is I wasn’t meant to try hard to untangle them and make them make more sense?

What if I was meant to feel all of these emotions, to ride them, to acknowledge them, to see them, to talk to them?

What if I wasn’t meant to just mourn the loss of a previous story that was meant to have a different ending?

What if I was meant to re-write now a new story where some of the characters have moved positions, but where everyone is still ever present?

What if my remembering wasn’t meant to be all painfuland full of what-ifs?

What if my remembering was meant for me to bathein my loved one’s light? What if my remembering was meant to be cherished and witnessed and included in my life going forward as beauty and grace and deep understanding?

What if I didn’t need to carry my grief like a heavy load?

What if I could allow myself to share my story with others, so I could put the load down and we can all deeply listen to each other?

What if I wasn’t meant to feel my grief as if I am the only one carrying these sorts of feelings today?

What if it was meant for my grief to teach me humility and the experience of everyone around me?

What if my grief wasn’t a burden laid at my doorstep or like a ton of bricks someone gave me to carry on my back?

What if my grief is a gift someone passed to me to tend, to consider, to care for? A reminder of my love for them and the joys we shared together.

What if I wasn’t meant to get over my grief? 

What if I was meant to just sit with it, like sitting on a bench with a friend, a cup of tea in our hands, watching the sunset on a perfect blue sky day?

What if my grief isn’t a portal to my pain? 

What if my grief is a portal to my joy? 

Artist Bio

Originally from Sheffield in the north of the UK, Jennie currently lives in Olympia, WA, with her two beloved rescue dogs, Mun'i and Xena. She is the Creative Director and Founder of Death Dancer and likes to refer to herself as a Soul Doula, helping and supporting people with their end of life experiences and reflections. 

Death Dancer was born not long after she experienced carbon monoxide and gas poisoning, along with B6 Toxicity, in 2021. She thought she was dying several times, which led her to reflect deeply on her own mortality and the inevitability of death. Two years into her recovery, she started working on a documentary idea and began interviewing Death Professionals to help her process her own death anxiety.  Inspired by this reflective process, she then went on to create conceptual mixed media art pieces related to Death & Dying, Loss, and Living, which led to the curation of an art exhibit for the Fall Olympia Arts Walk in October 2024. 

Her art practice has developed ever since and more and more ideas keep flowing to help us open up the conversation around death and dying and grief.