MY mother loved a place in her childhood and lost it. She had a phrase that stuck in my head: “For who can measure the sorrow of one who has loved a place that the world has power to destroy.”
I always thought it was from a poem but, despite ceaseless trawling of the internet by the AI bots, Google cannot trace it for me. Perhaps I’ve misremembered it.
I thought of it this week when I returned to a park that’s haunted my imagination since I stumbled on it 20 years ago. Nirvana Park in Koonawarra is an enigma. About five acres of park or garden, in the midst of other large private gardens.
There are no signs to tell you it’s a public place, just a couple of overgrown signs announcing an entrance. Hard to resist and I didn’t.