we go together
“Grace and gratitude belong together like heaven and earth.
Grace evokes gratitude like the voice an echo.
Gratitude follows grace as thunder follows lightening.” ~Barth
life: acoustic & amplified
poetry, quotes & thoughts about life
Archive for the month “November, 2014”
words of heart
What does it mean? Lord knows; least of all I.
Faced with it, schoolboys are shy,
And grown-ups speak it at moments of excess
Which later seem more or less
Unfeasible. It is equivocal, sentimental,
Debatable, really a sort of lentil—
Neither pea nor bean. Sometimes it’s a muscle,
Sometimes courage or at least hustle,
Sometimes a core or center, but mostly it’s
A sound that slushily fits
The meters of popular songwriters without
Meaning anything. It is stout,
Leonine, chicken, great, hot, warm, cold,
Broken, whole, tender, bold,
Stony, soft, green, blue, red, white,
Faint, true, heavy, light,
Open, down, shallow, etc. No wonder
Our superiors thunder
Against it. And yet in spite of a million abuses
The word survives; its uses
Are such that it remains virtually indispensable
And, I think, defensible.
The Freudian terminology is awkward or worse,
And suggests so many perverse
Etiologies that it is useless; but “heart” covers
The whole business, lovers
To monks, i.e., the capacity to love in the fullest
Sense. Not even the dullest
Reader misapprehends it, although locating
It is a matter awaiting
Someone more ingenious than I. But given
This definition, driven
Though it is out of a poet’s necessity, isn’t
The word needed at present
As much as ever, if it is well written and said,
With the heart and the head?
An Apology for Using the Word ‘Heart’ in Too Many Poems in by Hayden Carruth
tapestry
We are God’s thread
weaving through the tapestry of life,
our masterpiece is slowly
created.
Potential for beauty, we can’t know,
or even fathom,
unfolding,
becoming,
revealing our glory
so bright
it makes the sun squint
and reach for sunglasses.
Grace producing brilliance
so far beyond what we would claim ourselves.
We step shining into the gray,
as we open to the new.
Virtues, like jewels appearing,
sparkling in the moonlight.
As we step into the needle’s eye,
off the edge of the known,
into spirit worlds unending,
the angels catch their breath,
cheering our sheer audacity,
our blazing garments,
dazzled by the vision
God is revealing through His creation.
As we surrender to the greatest mystery,
the beauty we inhabit
becomes us,
walking in humble clay,
eyes outshining those stars
set in the heavens,
until we totally disappear, and all that’s left
is holiness
so pure
all we can do
is
bow in wonder
at what God can do
with a fragile human.
We give thanks
as the silk thread
becomes liquid
gold and silver
opening us ever
deeper, wider
pure and simple
glory
as we realize our place.
We are the temple of our creator.
The home of God.
ACL 1/ 19/14
living gratitude
Gratitude is not a passive response to something given to us, gratitude arises from paying attention, from being awake in the presence of everything that lives within and without us. Gratitude is not necessarily something that is shown after the event, it is the deep, a-priori state of attention that shows we understand and are equal to the gifted nature of life.
… to intuit inner lives beneath surface lives, to inhabit many worlds at once in this world, to be a someone amongst all other someones, and therefore to make a conversation without saying a word, is to deepen our sense of presence and therefore our natural sense of thankfulness that everything happens both with us and without us, that we are participants and witness all at once.
Thankfulness finds its full measure in generosity of presence, both through participation and witness… Thanksgiving happens when our sense of presence meets all other presences.
(©2013 David Whyte – Excerpted from ‘GRATITUDE’ From the upcoming book of essays CONSOLATIONS: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words).
Happy Thanksgiving! 👄
Thanks-full for you
Ever meet someone who immediately fits right into your bones? Someone you just want to talk to for 5-10-unlimited days straight, just to see where the conversation could take you? Someone who speaks your language, makes you laugh AND gives you chill bumps in that brief encounter? sigh…I hope you have…cause it’s really good!
Friendship is like a garden. -Al
Never put a period where God put a comma… – Al
Let us be grateful to people who make us happy;
they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.
-Marcel Proust
don’t wait…do it yourself!
I am so tired of waiting,
Aren’t you,
For the world to become good
And beautiful and kind?
-Langston Hughes
Dr. Chuck DeGroat’s blog on Ferguson is so important! Please read it!!! Jesus always challenges us to break the chains that bind. We are never allowed to stay comfortable, but to go!
http://chuckdegroat.net/2014/11/25/ferguson-a-gospel-issue/
leaving
Dead leaves crackle and shout their praise,
shake their shakers and noisemakers,
applauding in gratitude
for all the green that has gone,
all the life, the breathing in and out,
the shade, the birds sheltered
and bugs fed, air cleansed,
the nations healed, the earth renewed.
Give thanks
for the gifts offered, the gifts surrendered,
the mistakes made, the afternoons spent.
Give thanks for the nights
when even the leaves rested.
Give thanks for ourselves, finely veined,
the chewed edges of grief, love given,
our letting go and arriving.
Kick the leaves.
It was good, it was good.
Give thanks for the welcoming earth,
receiving life and death with open arms,
making of our words and hands
a compost for others.
Give thanks that it all settles
into the dark, into the moist mystery,
already, under scumbling clouds
devoted to the green rising.
Kick up for joy the heart’s dry husk,
this blessed sackcloth, future’s bones,
the peace of doing without,
this rustling flesh, this loss.
The white oak, the red oak, the hickory,
the maple, the beech, the ash, all praise,
the grasses, the dry grasses praise.
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
http://www.unfoldinglight.net
As we express our gratitude,
we must never forget that the highest
appreciation is not to utter words,
but to live by them.
-John F. Kennedy
Give thanks to the Lord, call upon His name,
make known His deeds among the people.
Glory you in His holy name;
let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord.
-1 Chronicles 16:8,10
Maritta Terrell
Thoughts are also posted at:
http://thoughtsaday.blogspot.com/
thoughts become us
No news story suddenly just begins as a headlines — every single one begins as a line of thought running through somebody’s heart.
And better stories begin around our dinner tables and our kitchen sinks. Cultural change doesn’t happen by us throwing stones but by us becoming rock solid in our commitment to personal change.
When a man doesn’t respect a woman, he disrespects what it means to be a man.
read full, so important blog post at
http://www.aholyexperience.com/2014/11/35-things-we-need-to-tell-our-sons-about-harassment-assault-boys-will-be-boys/
Mystery is at the heart of creativity. That, and surprise. – Julia Cameron
❤️ photo by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT
life: acoustic & amplified 