About Olivka

I grew up between communist Poland and England, belonging entirely to neither.

Too colourful for one, too honest for the other.

As a child, I disappeared into the Polish forests for hours, alone or with my magical grandfather, picking mushrooms, lying under trees, absorbed in pine-needled boredom until imagination took over.

‘Reality’ lost its priority; my Babcia would clap her hands in front of me to snap me back, join them in spirit and eat my supper.

In England, my mother soaked me in folk music; I happily trailed after her to the northern English folk festival scene. A world of old men and older pubs, pinched snuff and winks. The cupping of ears to hear cleaner vocals, restless yet purposeful fiddles and soft tin whistles rising in sound as climbing vines in the room. Mama wet her bodhrán with beer before it was beat and fed me prawn cocktail crisps.

In the years to come, I was to find out who my father was and that I had unknowingly followed him into storytelling, directing, singing, and music. Allowing poems to burst me open and the lure of the theatre. A shining example of nature versus nurture, if ever I was one.

Over the years, I have been invited to apprentice with medicine teachers and lineage keepers; I'm deeply honoured by what they saw in me, and grateful for all they shared with me. The truth is, it hurt to say no; I ached to belong and to be carried by a relational wisdom, yet I also knew I had to honour my own ancestral and inner calling.

So I spent many hours alone.

By fires. In forests. By the sea. Muttering, mumbling, writing, learning to trust the invisible realms and their beautiful and devastating truths.

I've been broken through by songs and poems in the middle of the night. Through breastfeeding. Through sorrow and longing. Through loneliness. At times I’ve glimpsed the ankles of the muses as they leave their music behind with me, but I never told them no.

I have always been their servant.

I've probably spent too much time alone.

Then again, sometimes solitude is the only place quiet enough to hear the stories.

These days, people find me through writing, music and embodied ritual. Nothing makes me happier than mumbling to a flame or singing over smoke.

I live with my husband of many years, our two sons and dog. I walk the black sand beach most days.

I love making stew, chocolate and mischief.

I've been quietly building my inner world for most of my life.

It has become too full to keep to myself any longer.

This next chapter is about the sharing of what has moved through me, and I am delighted you have found me.