life: acoustic & amplified

poetry, quotes & thoughts about life

Archive for the category “Beginning”

05 Mar 2016

take a breath

  
In these times when anger

 Is turned into anxiety

 And someone has stolen

 The horizons and mountains,
Our small emperors on parade

 Never expect our indifference

 To disturb their nakedness. 
They keep their heads down

 And their eyes gleam with reflection

 From aluminum economic ground,
The media wraps everything 

 In a cellophane of sound,

 And the ghost surface of the virtual

 Overlays the breathing earth. 
The industry of distraction

 Makes us forget

 That we live in a universe. 
We have become converts

 To the religion of stress

 And its deity of progress;
That we may have courage

 To turn aside from it all

 And come to kneel down before the poor,

 To discover what we must do,

 How to turn anxiety

 Back into anger,

 How to find our way home. 

🏡

John O’Donohue 
‘For Citizenship’ from BENEDICTUS

  

Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.         – Jean-Paul Sartre

  
photo sources at http://www.pinterest.com

Posted in America, anger, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, Beliefs, Career, Choice, compassion, confidence, connection, courage, Encouragement, find art at pinterest, Freedom, Hope, Imagine, Life, Peace, politics, power, Reality | Leave a comment
29 Feb 2016

extra special

  
An extra day —

Like the painting’s fifth cow,
who looks out directly,
straight toward you,
from inside her black and white spots. 

An extra day —

Accidental, surely:
the made calendar stumbling over the real
as a drunk trips over a threshold
too low to see.

An extra day —

With a second cup of black coffee.
A friendly but businesslike phone call.
A mailed-back package.
Some extra work, but not too much —
just one day’s worth, exactly.

An extra day —

Not unlike the space
between a door and its frame
when one room is lit and another is not,
and one changes into the other
as a woman exchanges a scarf.

An extra day —

Extraordinarily like any other.
And still
there is some generosity to it,
like a letter re-readable after its writer has died.

💌

February 29 by Jane Hirshfield

  

 

Posted in Adventure, art, attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, Choice, commitment, confidence, connection, courage, dark, Death, determination, Encouragement, Faith, find art at pinterest, Grieving, Happy Holiday!, healing, home, Letting Go, Life, Losing, Love, Reflection, soul and spirit, strength, Trust, truth, Vulnerability, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
27 Feb 2016

talk to the birds    

  

http://www.StripyArms.com
👐🏻

It’s all connected –

All the love,

All the loss,

All the joy,

All the pain. 
The world is made of God. 

We live in the ocean of God’s breath, 

His very words. 
We are all artists. 

We all speak creation. 

Our words are our greatest art form,

make sure they create a masterpiece. 
God is love is life is truth is word is love is –

every little thing is connected to each other.   
Everything I really needed to know 

I learned from the ocean and the trees. 

The mountains introduced me to the angels. 

Acorns were my very first teachers,

the finest flock of seagulls are my most recent.

 

We are the temple. 

We includes the universe we find ourselves in. 

We are brothers and sisters to stars and starships. 

🚀

AL

  
 

   

 

Posted in action, Adventure, attitude, awareness, balance, be, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, find art at pinterest, Letting Go, Life, Love | Leave a comment
22 Feb 2016

Oh yes! 

  
What a great day! and now this gift from Richard Rohr!! 

Unlearning as I go today! 

Posted in attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, Beliefs, Change, courage, Faith, find art at pinterest, grace, Gratitude, healing | Leave a comment
20 Feb 2016

morning blessing

   
photos by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT

   I place on the alter of dawn:

 The quiet loyalty of breath,

 The tent of thought where I shelter,

 Waves of desire I am shore to

 And all beauty drawn to the eye. 
May my mind come alive today

 To the invisible geography

 That invites me to new frontiers,

 To break the dead shell of yesterdays,

 To risk being disturbed and changed. 
May I have the courage today

 To live the life that I would love,

 To postpone my dream no longer

 But do at last what I came here for

 And waste my heart on fear no more. 

🌀

  – John O’Donohue
Excerpt from, ‘A Morning Offering’

 TO BLESS THE SPACE BETWEEN US (US) / BENEDICTUS (Europe)

  
In the space between breaths 

It can be gone 

A months worth of words 

Erased with a fingertip 

A 12, 30 even 60 year marriage over 

With 4 words spoken: 

I want a divorce 

A home with all it’s possessions 

Destroyed in a matter of minutes in the fury of nature – 

Fire or storm 

Life 

Love

So fragile 

With no guarantees 

Of longevity 

Or comfort 

Begs to be felt

Now 

To be counted for the sake of goodness 

This is the only moment that counts 

The only thing eternal 

Don’t wait 

Take a deep deep breath 

Of the spirit that is giving it all 

Say thank you 

For the only gift that matters 

The only thing that remains 

All else can be destroyed 

When nothing else remains 

What is this eternal gift,

given new every morning? 

Love 

💖

AL

 

quote photo sources found at http://www.pinterest.com 

Posted in action, Adventure, attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, beloved, Blessing, connection, courage, Faith, find art at pinterest, Glory, Gratitude, Happiness, inspiration, Letting Go, Life, light, Love, nature, Patience, Peace | Leave a comment
18 Feb 2016
2 Comments

When we walk on the earth with reverence, beauty will decide to trust us.   – John O’Donohue

  
love warriors walk through this world

love dripping from open hands

falling onto shattered pieces of the broken 

staining bits of the kaleidoscope of hearts

stepping carefully

slowing down

as the ones who have forgotten to know

appear to do battle

not knowing what they have forgotten…

we are all the light

we are each the beloved..

please let me hold you

touch those wounded places

rub love on the sore spots

until you remember

what you already know

stay here with me 

for a long long while

let’s walk together

connecting 

hands

hearts

love

as we go

allowing the drip to become 

a pour

a fountain 

a river

an ocean

as we sail our sea green ship

into this mystic world beyond the stars 

beyond the moon

and once again

find ourselves home in the sun

☀️

AL

  
  
photos found at http://www.pinterest.com

🌙

At the heart of things is a secret law of balance and when our approach is respectful, sensitive and worthy, gifts of healing, challenge and creativity open to us. A gracious approach is the key that unlocks the treasure of encounter. The way we are present to each other is frequently superficial. We become more interested in ‘connection’ rather than communion. In many areas of our lives the rich potential of friendship and love remains out of our reach because we push towards ‘connection.’ When we deaden our own depths, we cannot strike a resonance in those we meet or in the work we do. A reverence of approach awakens depth and enables us to be truly present where we are. When we approach with reverence great things decide to approach us. Our real life comes to the surface and its light awakens the concealed beauty of things. When we walk on the earth with reverence, beauty will decide to trust us. The rushed heart and the arrogant mind lack the gentleness and patience to enter that embrace. Beauty is mysterious, a slow presence who waits for the ready, expectant heart. 

💖

 John O’Donohue 

 Excerpt from BEAUTY

 

photo by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT 

Posted in action, attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, beloved, Choice, commitment, compassion, courage, determination, Encouragement, Faith, find art at pinterest, Letting Go, Life, light, Love, Poetry, power, Prayer
17 Feb 2016

am i?

 

 Quiet friend who has come so far, 
feel how your breathing makes more space around you. 

Let this darkness be a bell tower 

and you the bell. As you ring, 
what batters you becomes your strength. 

Move back and forth into the change. 

What is it like, such intensity of pain? 

If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine. 
In this uncontainable night, 

be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses, 

the meaning discovered there. 
And if the world has ceased to hear you, 

say to the silent earth: I flow. 

To the rushing water, speak: I am

🛤

qII, 29 [Let This Darkness Be a Bell Tower] by Rainer Maria Rilke

   

 Crossroads and choices, now is the time to decide which path will lead to the garden and more healthy life choices. One just doesn’t wait until Midsummer and think about growing fresh produce for a salad.

   – Old Moss Woman’s Secret Garden/facebook

  
When an open heart meets an open hand, the result is more feast and more love, enough for a small village to be nurtured from this drawer alone. I see this and recognize him instantly: a soul brother, a lover of life, a father, a friend, a ringleader, a listener, a creative co-conspirator, a holder…of space, of hearts, of possibilities. A man with much to give and more to say, to a yearning, hopeful world.

   – Jen Lemen

   
 photo sources found at http://www.pinterest.com

Posted in action, Adventure, attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, Beliefs, beloved, big, Blessing, Choice, commitment, connection, courage, determination, do, Faith, find art at pinterest, Happiness, healing, inspiration, intimacy, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, Passion, Patience | Leave a comment
06 Feb 2016

Oh so good!!! xo

   
releasing all that holds me from 

allowing the flow

stepping into what feels so good

 love opening in every direction from my center 

returning to me from every direction to my center

I fly free  

At home in the blue sky

 💞

AL

Posted in action, Adventure, Alone, attitude, awareness, balance, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, beloved, Blessing, Change, Choice, connection, courage, create | Leave a comment
03 Feb 2016

now open

  
You must give birth to your images.

They are the future waiting to be born.

Fear not the strangeness you feel.

The future must enter you, long before it happens.

Just wait for the birth,

for the hour of new clarity.

🌀
– Rainer Maria Rilke

 

Today is my friend, writer, fellow spirit seeker, Donna Knutson’s birthday!! Wishing her happy today and every day! 

Sharing and loving her beautiful thoughts and words describing the lovely world event of her time here:
When 58 is Almost Gone and 59 Flowers Are Coming on Strong 

Purple Iris …I let things die, and filled in holes…watered children and sappy songs.

Ranted about the radiance of Angels and cardboard boxes filled with 36 years of married love…

I chopped up word search puzzles because there is passion and paradox in loving words that heal, instead of hate…then tied them on a string, like prayer flags blowing through the bedroom in a February wind.  

I wrote Voice with purple pen on a hundred sheets of silk like paper, folded them in drawers and placed them near the windows, so the morning sun could warm their chords and prepare the world for what sound would come that day.

I angled photos and trinkets from baskets, memorizing short periods of my day where love was the only witness to my growing , to fading a bit more like Autumn, then into a bright summers sunset spoken softly now, rose colored, like winter…

Family and friendships took in artists and dreamers…wedding vows that added deeper love to our days…heart shaped rocks in tiny boxes on tables to say we belong to one another…and children that grow into wonderful stories of every lasting love…

It was August before I blew kisses to the toddlers playing in a nearby gym, their jumping and fantasies whirling with my inner child, shaking fingers and toes, while hopping through a hundred thresholds, finding keys to a million doors…

I taught class while learning the heart of acceptance, forgiveness, fables and follies…how one can know absolutely nothing, and everything one needs to know…to be a water-bearer flowing…to kneel while pouring…to bend at just the right moment, to wash a glass, dimly lit…

I fought a concrete city with a magical jungle holding religions and relationships…forgave myself for not knowing how long I had been loved and known…how one gift could change it all…found sacred ground under a community with feet. Dancers who know how to move to a rhythm and a beat…

God speaking Yes, porous and free …a mystical thread sewn into the bone of the body, 

A year like no other…just beginning to gather purple Iris for another…

Beauty,

Donna 

   
    
 
photo sources found at http://www.pinterest.com

Posted in action, attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, Choice, confidence, connection, courage, find art at pinterest, grace, Growth, inspiration, intimacy, Letting Go, Life, Love | Leave a comment
07 Jan 2016

don’t try too hard

 

 God just likes making things.  
He doesn’t try too hard. Comfortable. 

No particular message in mind –

Bugs, 

Flowers,

Birds, 

Stones,

Trees,

those beauties with leaves and sap.  

Shells of all sorts, 

revealing the sound of the ocean – 

even in the middle of the desert. 

He never runs out of fresh ideas,

new angles, 

dazzling variations of old themes.  

He makes masterpieces, 

out of scavenged and wasted things.  

Beauty within ashes and scars. 

Gardens and vegetables from rotted orange rinds and other scraps.  

Jewels from lumps of coal. 

Our creativity, at least in part, 

comes from resting in,

spending time with,

opening from within. 

Prayer as emptiness. 

Prayer as silence.  

Prayer as stillness.  

Prayer as rest. 

Prayer as opening. 

Prayer without wanting or asking. 

Prayer as presence. 

Then,

sometimes, 

God, 

the muse,

shows up,

hangs out on the sofa,

and our hearts begin to sing,

and we simply just can’t help making things ourselves…

💞

AL

(based on the book: the holy wild by Mark Buchanan) 

 

  

 After the glut of sparkle and sentiment,
all that heavy gold and glory,

it’s kind of a relief to return 

to an orderly house, a clean mantle,

a blue and white shirt, the regular dishes.
The world is plain, snow is crusted, 

trees more bare than in November.

The marsh like the underside of a carpet,

the cattails bland and spent.

The asphalt road has nothing to say,

the gray sky shrugs and says, “Ditto.”
God stands there, 

hands in the pockets of a drab jacket,

gazing at the brook’s blank of ice,

says, “Yeah, I like to hang out here.

It’s relaxing. Clears my head.”
I come home to a quiet house,

refrigerator humming. This too is holy.

I sit on the couch, gaze out at the yard.

“Huh,” I say. “What do you know?

Pockets.” 
__________________ 

Steve Garnaas-Holmes

Unfolding Light

http://www.unfoldinglight.net

 

   

 

Posted in Adventure, art, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, create, find art at pinterest, Freedom, Glory, Gospel, grace, Gratitude, healing, inspiration, Letting Go, Love, receiving | Leave a comment

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