A GRANDMOTHER has published an anthology of poems and prose in memory of her grandson who took his life.

Ben Osborne, an assistant manager at Penrith and Appleby leisure centres, died aged 27 in 2014. Hundreds of people attended his funeral.

Now Ben’s grandmother Hilary Binks - who moved to Penrith with her husband, Eric, shortly after Ben’s death - has published A Rainbow Anthology to coincide with Mental Health Awareness Week and Dementia Action Week.

Funds from sales of the book will go to the Alzheimer’s Society, for which Hilary is a volunteer. She said: “When we moved here I was in a very dark place. I did not want to be social or help people in any way. But by Christmas I was volunteering for the Alzheimer’s Society, as both my mother and grandmother had had dementia. I began to chat with a neighbour, Brenda Rack, who told me about her recent diagnosis of dementia.

“She was a pianist, artist and writer and was desperate to form a writers’ group. I helped set that up and it’s from that we now have the anthology.”

Sadly, Brenda died in January this year. Her family gave Hilary permission to use some of her work in the anthology.

Part of the newly-published book draws on each colour of the rainbow. Members of the town’s memory café, who live with dementia, were asked for their associations with the colours. Hilary then wrote prose or poetry pulling the memories together.

Hilary is also a dementia-friendly church enabler at St Andrew’s, Penrith. She also helps lead the Alzheimer’s Society’s ‘Singing for the Brain’ sessions in the town’s Hub.

She said: “After Ben’s death we were very thankful for the fact that we were grounded in a Christian community. We had a very strong faith and that was not shaken at all. When we moved to Penrith and St Andrew’s, people very quickly welcomed us and cared for us.

“Although the colour went from our lives at the time of Ben’s death, this book has helped to reinstate it in a way. He will be forever in our lives. He was such a lovely young man and he has been our motivation for doing something with our lives.”

A Rainbow Anthology can be bought at St Andrew’s Church café, at rainbowanthology@btinternet.com or via Facebook at ‘A Rainbow Anthology Living Well in Colour’.