life: acoustic & amplified

poetry, quotes & thoughts about life

Archive for the category “Growth”

 holding on…letting go…   

   

   
I closed my eyes

and returned 

to people, 

and places,

I love. 
I closed my eyes

and opened

my heart

to magic,

and mystery,

I fell in love. 
I closed my eyes

and committed 

my life

to love, to You,

my soul’s beloved. 
I closed my eyes

and saw

a new heaven,

and earth,

a world of love. 
I closed my eyes

and found

myself,

within myself

deep calling to deep
I closed my eyes

and sang

my words,

songs you gave me,

my love song to You. 
AL

 

photo sources at www.pinterest.com 

days of… 

  
Days of wine and focus

of hanging on

of staying strong

of keeping faith

of sitting still

of being silent

of thinking in beautiful 

of standing in my own shoes

of letting go 

of loving you through the distance

of letting you lead

of feeling the passion

of attempting not to burn up

of recognizing the spectacular

of allowing the mystery

of hearing the call

of accepting what is

of not crossing borders or boundaries

of opening and opening

of trusting the journey

of seeing the face of God

of surrender into something bigger than I can know

of making the daily commitment

of acknowledging the grace

of thanking for everything

of looking for the miracles

of talking to trees

of taking time to prepare

of expressing my love

of helping in time of need

of following my own path

of obedience rather than selfishness

of love and love and love

of all things love
AL

  

  Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

  

interesting conversations (grade: C-)

  
HAMLET: To be, or not to be–that is the question:

Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles

And by opposing end them. To die, to sleep–

No more–and by a sleep to say we end

The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks

That flesh is heir to. ‘Tis a consummation

Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep–

To sleep–perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub,

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause. There’s the respect

That makes calamity of so long life.

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,

Th’ oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely

The pangs of despised love, the law’s delay,

The insolence of office, and the spurns

That patient merit of th’ unworthy takes,

When he himself might his quietus make

With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear,

To grunt and sweat under a weary life,

But that the dread of something after death,

The undiscovered country, from whose bourn

No traveller returns, puzzles the will,

And makes us rather bear those ills we have

Than fly to others that we know not of?

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,

And thus the native hue of resolution

Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,

And enterprise of great pitch and moment

With this regard their currents turn awry

And lose the name of action. — Soft you now,

The fair Ophelia! — Nymph, in thy orisons

Be all my sins remembered.

🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀

Read more at http://www.monologuearchive.com/s/shakespeare_001.html#q445B8QYR85jGYt2.99

 

 I think of difficult days
Days I struggle to stay alive

To keep my head above water

To put one foot in front of the other

To stay hydrated in the middle of my water works
I think of days of joy

When everything sparkles

When I say hello to the bright-eyed me in the mirror

When I am so glad I’m alive

So connected to the whole
I think about the moods of nature

The sunny days

The gray days

Days of angry storms

or gentle raindrops

Days of extreme
Just like me

Extreme weather

caused by my energy

the energy around me 

environmental and

relational factors
personal forecast

Todays weather calls for

Sunny outlook

with occasional clouds

a few showers through out the day

wine at sunset

moon full tonight  

with a dream or two of your kisses

 still warm on my lips

floating through

Waking to a great day tomorrow 

until I see you again

  😱😱😱😱😱😱😱

AL

  
Listen to Amos Lee sing Soul Suckers http://youtu.be/zqidM_U9rgU

☔️☀️☔️☀️☔️☀️

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

   
  

when we grow afraid we forget 

 
 I believe in all that has never yet been spoken.

I want to free what waits within me

so that what no one has dared to wish for
may for once spring clear

without my contriving.
If this is arrogant, God, forgive me,

but this is what I need to say.

May what I do flow from me like a river,

no forcing and no holding back,

the way it is with children.
Then in these swelling and ebbing currents,

these deepening tides moving out, returning,

I will sing you as no one ever has,
streaming through widening channels

into the open sea.
I, 12 [I believe in all that has never been spoken] by Rainer Maria Rilke. 

🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊🌊

  
      
How can you not see it,

if you stand still enough,

or walk out far enough:

the light shimmering from every leaf,

the actual hardness of every stone?

This stone says something

of humility and presence, 

of where it came from, and the belly of stars,

but it stays silent to draw you nearer.

We are, all of us, even the thin geranium

on the back stoop, reaching up

for light, for life, for beauty, 

singing out with the great silent voice

of the immense glory of being,

the long, amazing story

and a love story it is.

Without your having to remember—

such a gift, such a gift—

your lungs open to the world

and take in life, each moment.  

Who gave you that?

How can you not sing, even in silence?

When we grow afraid we forget,

we wear protective layers 

of things to believe, things to do,

so many things to do,

so that we don’t come too near

and catch fire. 
_________________  

Steve Garnaas-Holmes

Unfolding Light

http://www.unfoldinglight.net

🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

 
  (I agree, Mary Oliver…hum, hum)
Listen to Mat Kearney sing Closer to Love http://youtu.be/EMRXXBGotnw

🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀🍀

Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513 

Note to Self:   

 
Inspiration from

 my son, Brandon (he’s made my mamma-heart very happy this morning)…LISTEN to Paul Baribeau sing Ten Things! http://youtu.be/9X_o_BAUJ-c 

 
 

hearing

  

Now I understand that there are two melodies playing,

one below the other, one easier to hear, the other
lower, steady, perhaps more faithful for being less heard

yet always present.
When all other things seem lively and real,

this one fades. Yet the notes of it
touch as gently as fingertips, as the sound

of the names laid over each child at birth.
I want to stay in that music without striving or cover.

If the truth of our lives is what it is playing,
the telling is so soft

that this mortal time, this irrevocable change,
becomes beautiful. I stop and stop again

to hear the second music.
I hear the children in the yard, a train, then birds.

All this is in it and will be gone. I set my ear to it as I would to a heart.

🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶

The Second Music by Annie Lighthart 

 
🎼🎼🎼🎼🎼🎼🎼🎼🎼🎼🎼🎼

In every instant, two gates.

One opens to fragrant paradise, one to hell.

Mostly we go through neither.
Mostly we nod to our neighbor,

lean down to pick up the paper,

go back into the house.
But the faint cries—ecstasy? horror?

Or did you think it the sound

of distant bees,

making only the thick honey of this good life?

 Listen to Norah Jones sing One Flight Down http://youtu.be/56RJ0AKtpv0

🎵🎵🎵🎵🎵🎵🎵🎵🎵🎵🎵🎵

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

 

 

on growing strong bones 

  

backbones get built

vertebrae by vertebrae

with every victory

with every heartache

with every triumph

with every shattering

with each awakening
they become sturdy

bearing the weight of new consciousness

embodying self-love

strengthened, emboldened
yet still flexible, yet still able

to make flowing and fluid movement

undulating with pulsing life

able to stand firm in the face of a challenge or adversity
backbones don’t magically appear because we wish them into being
backbones need nurturing and kindness and discipline and conviction and intention

and desire

to form and develop
they help us be stalwart and valiant

protecting the soft, vulnerable, tender inner parts of our being
robust, hearty boundaries that

don’t cut us off from nourishment — they make sure we’re getting the right kind
the fortitude to love, not blindly, but with courage. 

💪🏻💪🏾💪🏽💪🏼💪🏿💪🏼💪

    How Backbones Get Built by Eloiza Jorge

   https://deepeningwisdom.wordpress.com/2015/05/25/how-backbones-get-built-a-poem/
   
   

  
Never quit. Never. Rest when you need to, then get back up. Strength comes as you walk. Backbones come one good choice at a time. 

 Listen to Katy Perry sing Roar http://youtu.be/CevxZvSJLk8

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

 

I am a poet

  It has taken a while to embrace the poet.

The desire having been born much later in life,
to write poetry,
to bring to life, with words,
what I see, feel, moments of sanguinity.

I have never doubted the words I have written
because they were written in truth, my truth.
But I did doubt the title.
Poet.
What? These lines? Poetry?

There was too much significance behind the title.
A poet.
Wordsworth, Shelley, Dickinson, Frost, Walt Whitman…
Oh my. The idea left me breathless.
What was I playing at?

But then, the answer was blindingly simple.
Take away the significance.

Aren’t poems moments of grace, of revelation?

Humming to a birdsong,
delighting at the sight of valleys and mountains,
closing our eyes in ecstasy at the sweetness of a fruit
or the texture of bark under our fingertips…
Aren’t these the poetic murmurings of one’s heart?

While some of us choose to put it all on paper,
others choose to carry it all within their hearts.
Well then, underneath the cloak of conventionality,
aren’t we all poetic?
Aren’t we all poets?

👤👤👤👤👤👤👤👤

I am a poet by Rama Desai

https://ramaink.wordpress.com/author/ramaink/
👤👤👤👤👤👤👤👤

 

   

  Listen to Lake Street Dive sing We Love All the Same Songs http://youtu.be/9sNbyjfgccc
photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/513

Can Broken Wings Fly?

 


Broken wings can fly?

Who will mend them/who will rend them?

Who will tend them/who will send them?

 

I have been on the road less traveled

And seen life and death unraveled

Torn and broken down;

And voices filled with gravel!

 

I have been in nothing more

And seen rapacious roar

And heard the unknown sound

Speaking loudly,

From the ground!

 

And through my eyes, through the hue

Ebbing ever from greed to blue

Sometimes blinded by the light

Rarely knowing what is right

I travel through the maze

And broken through the haze

 

But my heart has never broken!

It beats with never ending light

And I know not where it leads me,

But I know it leads to you!

In sky or in the sea,

Always spoken if not seen

Or seen if not spoken;

 

The vision never broken!

👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻

by Matthew Mele

 

 

 

 

 

listen to Paul McCartney sing Blackbird http://youtu.be/8ehhZ53zysQ

Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513 

 

 

  

the power of broken hearts

 

  

The beginning is such a good place to be. There is much in store. But there is acknowledgment of what came before the beginning to mark this moment as a beginning. And in that place I was there, too. But let’s start where beginning is—the union of Me and you, the awakening of your heart, bit by bit, to Me.

 

I awaken you further, now.

 

These first starts are for you to appreciate the moments that came before them—to see where I was, what I was doing, before you recognized my presence. Let me take you back to where I was when you couldn’t see Me there. Perhaps the definitions of beginning will need to be rewritten.

 

I always begin again in you. 

 

I am the discovery of the beginning—all hope and life in you. I will give you a fresh start this day. I give you new breath, new eyes, new adventures to set out on with Me. But I want to start this beginning by going back to where I’ve always been with you.

 

I have always been with you, even when you couldn’t see it. I want to show you now.

🌠🌠🌠🌠🌠🌠🌠🌠🌠🌠

Loop @ Gather Ministries 

http://us5.campaign-archive1.com/?u=278b78041b94c30f445911b53&id=ae645e9e7d&e=b9eb1d83ef

 

 

 

photo sources found @ www.pinterest.com/al513

 

 

 

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