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
life: acoustic & amplified
poetry, quotes & thoughts about life
Archive for the category “create”
yes, please, beat again
Grace
Nothing I have ever done or will ever do
can separate me from
or bring me into the heart of the Beloved.
Oh, I can distract myself from the longing
that whispers day and night for that sacred union,
and some days I am too tired to notice
that what I ache for is and always has been here:
. . . . right here in and at my fingertips,
in the way the breeze lifts my hair,
the way the earth pulls me to her,
the way shared laughter makes my sides ache.
Nothing I have done or will ever do
can make me worthy or unworthy
of being touched by the Lover’s hand and heart,
of being the Lover’s hand and heart in the world.
Grace – the way Infinite Love
gives Himself to us in every moment,
the way God unfurls Her tender mercy in our hearts-
is a constant invitation to say with the fullness of our being:
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
❤️
~Oriah Mountain Dreamer
there is terrible beauty in every human heart
tell me a story that will live with me forever
love always shares grace always wins
you can’t miss if you show up
pay attention…
the message is always revealed at the appointed intersection
letting go brings the right miracle
at the right time the song playlist repeats
crazy love flows into mystic waters slowly drips the sweetest tupelo honey
deep calling to deep
honor chooses to say yes to the best invitations
making the call brings me the messages I need to build the new bridge from the friend bench of this manna-filled moment
there is always more than enough to share
gratitude buckets fill and overflow
removing scales from blurry, tearful, kaleidoscope eyes
as perfect peace falls into rightful place
color shards blooming into new masterpieces of never before seen glory
diamonds dance on the water
flaming beauty evolves, drives me to my knees,
shedding shoes, and fear,
as we talk
I lift my face to the sun and free soar
full wing, open soul, with the gulls,
who always fly in trust, never a shadow of doubt, that they are loved to the sky
right here, and in every tick of time,
in, and in between, every click of the second hand,
around the bend of eternity and back again
🌀
AL 1/30/16
in gratitude and honor for connecting with Liz on this beautiful morning of sun, warm and snow drifts
photo above by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT
🌃
photos found at http://www.pinterest.com
yesterday
yesterday I was born a leaf
a small fragile tender wisp
trembling as I hung on the vine
yesterday I was a gust of air
short lived, but not insignificant
full of bone rattling cold and hat disturbing bravado
yesterday I was a large, slow, snow flake
plopping down like a wet goose feather
making the world a magical place
yesterday I was a world made of glass
lying shattered on the floor
hoping to be recycled into a new and useful object
yesterday I was various people
a student, a host, a friend, a lover
feeling my way into the next moment hoping to find a way home
yesterday I stood tall as a tree
shaking, hurting, yet proud, with stubborn certainly
accepting what winter brings, gently weeping, waiting for spring
❄️
AL
what a glorious mess we are
We can’t find our path without getting messy. Messy comes with the territory. We came in messy. We learn messy. We love messy. We leave messy. I never found my way to clarity without first befriending confusion, in all its chaotic forms. I never found a path that felt like home before falling into quicksand. I never established a new way of being without trying the wrong way of being on for size. I never found the light without stumbling around in the dark. I never tasted God before getting a little dirt in my mouth. In the heart of the chaos is the clay that shapes us home.
Chaotic Magnificence!
🌀
– Jeff Brown an excerpt from the book Love it Forward
find photos at http://www.pinterest.com
arriving. departing.
Above the mountains
the geese turn into
the light again
painting their
black silhouettes
on an open sky.
Sometimes everything
has to be
enscribed across
the heavens
so you can find
the one line
already written
inside you.
Sometimes it takes
a great sky
to find that
first, bright
and indescribable
wedge of freedom
in your own heart.
Sometimes with
the bones of the black
sticks left when the fire
has gone out
someone has written
something new
in the ashes
of your life.
You are not leaving.
Even as the light
fades quickly now,
you are arriving.
…
The Journey by David Whyte
photos found at http://www.pinterest.com
perhaps
We talk about balance…
as if…
we can actually achieve such a thing
in this,
the odd numbered trinity-teeter-tottered
kaleidoscope of a heart, soul and mind
living within the human pie crust
we name skin!
It is our work
our great career –
to keep opening to the liquid mystery
of living in this very moment.
Free will choice,
our supreme gift –
our supreme curse.
Oh, yes,
we want things fixed.
We want to know,
to define truth,
to arrive and settle,
to judge others through our personal lens,
to be right, of course.
How do we live with the reality of ‘seeing in part’,
through a ‘dark veil’,
with just glimpses of the light in the night sky,
we fish in the darkness,
trying to catch one small piece of a star at a time,
just to have it burn out,
leaving us to go back and try again?
This is the life of the seekers,
the mystics,
the warriors,
who have been seized with the firm belief –
that life matters.
That love is the way to healing.
That there is always more of God to be had.
The mystery gets bigger with each illumination.
The balance comes from allowing it all.
Good. Bad.
Joy. Sorrow.
Sickness. Pain.
Poverty. Wealth.
Even the broken path,
the truth and the lies,
have eternal divine purpose.
Our task to
learn,
open,
love,
trust,
forgive,
heal,
move,
sing,
dance,
create,
keep letting go,
keep changing,
be present,
through it all.
We dream the large dreams of living into our best selves.
We focus intently on each small task before us.
We think,
We listen,
We give,
We receive.
We speak, when necessary.
We walk daily in vigilance.
Letting the legacy of each day stand on it’s own.
We live knowing our next choice is always our most important….
and so it goes
and so it goes
🌀
AL
Sometimes you have to leave
what you think you know
behind.
No one ever really wants to do this.
Knowing things
can be very comforting.
All day, soul whispers
what I need to know.
I don’t hear her
until I lay aside
cherished beliefs and assumptions
until I dare to be with the not-knowing.
And then. . . .
Well, that’s the risky part, isn’t it?
There is no telling
what living an ensouled life
might ask of us.
~Oriah “Mountain Dreamer” House
So this is where I am in writing the book, “The Choice,” -on the great plain of not knowing, offering myself- pen in hand- anyway. Each day, the darkness yields to the light, and words hit the page, surprising me. This is what it’s like: the light coming again and again, the darkness making the illumination breath-taking.
find photos at http://www.pinterest.com
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
each piece
I am struck by the otherness of things rather than their sameness.
The way a tiny pile of snow perches in the crook of a branch in the
tall pine, away by itself, high enough not to be noticed by people,
out of reach of stray dogs. It leans against the scaly pine bark, busy
at some existence that does not need me.
It is the differences of objects that I love, that lift me toward the rest
of the universe, that amaze me. That each thing on earth has its own
soul, its own life, that each tree, each clod is filled with the mud of
its own star. I watch where I step and see that the fallen leaf, old
broken grass, an icy stone are placed in exactly the right spot on the
earth, carefully, royalty in their own country
❄️
Looking for the Differences by Tom Hennen
❄️
top photo found at http://www.pinterest.com
photos by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT
❄️
O come thou Mystery,
unseen, unbidden, unfelt,
but so madly needed here.
Come to us
who push you away with our despair,
snare us with wonder.
Come to us, the lonely and broken,
O Small One,
not to solve but to be with.
Come to us who grieve
place or worth or hope,
and find it with us.
Come to us in our smugness
and lay yourself down in the manger
of our secret wounds.
Come to us in our privilege
and let us hang our lives
on a poor little peasant child.
Come to us in our violent fear
and calm us with your tiny voice.
Ask us to love you.
For us who find it hard to love each other,
come and gather us in a circle,
have us care, have us sing.
Come to us, too afraid to need,
be fragile among us,
and let us fall in love.
Neglect our neglect, Emmanuel,
come and be a tiny flame of love among us,
and light our own.
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
love beyond reason. trust without borders
photos by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT
We develop grace as we learn with the guiding hand of the universe, life will unfold exactly the way it should.
The idea of trusting the universe is a popular one these days, but many of us don’t know what this really means and we often have a hard time doing it. This is partly because the story of humankind is most often presented as a story about struggle, control, and survival, instead of one of trust and collaboration with the universe. Yet, in truth, we need to adhere to both ideas in this life.
On the one hand, there is much to be said about exerting control over our environment. We created shelter to protect ourselves from the elements. We hunted for animals and invented agriculture to feed ourselves. We built social infrastructures to protect ourselves and create community. This is how we survive and grow as a civilization. However, it is also clear that there are plenty of things that we cannot control, no matter how hard we try, and we often receive support from an unseen force – a universe that provides us with what we cannot provide for ourselves.
It is a good idea to take responsibility for the things in life that we can control or create. We work so we can feed, clothe, and shelter our loved ones and ourselves. We manifest our dreams and visions in physical form with hard work and forethought. But at a certain point, when have done all that we can, we must let go and allow the universe to take over. This requires trust. It requires a trust that runs deeper than just expecting things to turn out the way we want them to. Sometimes they will, and sometimes they won’t. We develop equanimity and grace as we learn to trust that, with the guiding hand of the universe, life will unfold exactly the way it should. We are engaged in an ongoing relationship with a universe that responds to our thoughts and actions.
🌀
dailyom.com
by Madisyn Taylor
Not known, because not looked for
But heard, half heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea.
Quick now, here, now, always –
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)…
– T. S. Eliot
🌀
‘What if it were so much
simpler than that’
said the wiseman.
‘But …’ said the fool
🌀
But Said the Fool by Nic Askew
life: acoustic & amplified 