free to go…
Listen to Diana Ross sing Do You Know Where You’re Going To? http://youtu.be/gsA-Xc6gWDE
photo and sources found @ www.pinterest.com
life: acoustic & amplified
poetry, quotes & thoughts about life
Archive for the category “Life”
what love looks like
Love heals. Heals and liberates. I use the word love, not meaning sentimentality, but a condition so strong that it may be that which holds the stars in their heavenly positions and that which causes the blood to flow orderly in our veins.
-Maya Angelou
There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. I John 4:18
top photo by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT
other photos found on facebook
💞
It’s hard to love someone really,
especially the annoying, the arrogant, the cruel—
because I want to be separate from them.
I don’t want to be one with them,
soiled by their sin, associated with their dirt.
I want to push their boat off in a good direction
but not be in their boat.
But to love someone
is to cease judging the cruel as more cruel than I.
To love someone is to go to heaven or hell with them,
to put my arm around them and go together.
To lay aside my private little self
and be part of our divine oneness.
God leaves the perfect halls of heaven
to be one of us, to be us,
mucked in our grime, weak as the weakest of us,
blamed with our worst, frail, faulty and failed.
It’s not the gracious, condescending gesture
to the needy that makes it love;
it’s the absence of distance, the common wound,
it’s the arm around one, walking the way with one,
the resurrecting grace of giving your whole self away,
changing someone’s life by giving them yours.
It’s hard to love really because you have to die.
You disappear. You stop being separate,
stop being a little “one” so far from the “other,”
and be One. Less than that is zero.
But it’s easy to love, really,
when finally in our failure we give up
and throw away our pretensions of virtue,
and dump out the cardboard box
of our our whole useless heart and all its little pieces,
and, becoming so emptied… wait,
and God fills us with God’s only love
that flows through us without our having to bother
with the work of getting in its way.
It’s hard to love really,
until we empty out
and shine.
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
giving thanks for a perfect night
important time spent
precious time together.
important words spoken
raw heart truth.
important choices made
driving…driving.
laughter, sunset, baseball, hotdog, peanuts, selfies…shared
the champagne of living.
not to mention the kissing…
mums the word
of the world beyond this world
where only two hearts can belong
and become more than they were before…
together.
💞
AL
Listen to Todd Rundgren song Love is the Answer http://youtu.be/IjMKz0wCGmw
as in poetry, so in life
Poetry’s favourite moment is when one loses one’s footing because of a landslide or seismic shaking of thought — Michel Leiris
Night Owl Poetry
poem found on facebook/parker palmer
Nature is our greatest teacher. Storms are part of life. Change is good…
You will learn by reading, but you will understand with love. – Rumi
does everything happen twice?
does anything come once and never show up again?
what happens if we pay attention to what comes to us in a day,
a week,
a year?
what about this morning?
will the sun ever shine quite this way again?
will I ever have another summer
where I actually love the heat of the dog days,
The Mets just keep winning,
I spend days waiting, and wanting, to be kissed by you,
and I am surrounded by fresh flowers every day?
AL
photo sources at www.pinterest.com
of mothering
“Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother” (Matthew 12:50).
My love, do you hear that music, the one where we dance and your steps are light and you swing?
You mother in the quiet places and in the moments when it is loud and it feels impossible to hear. You mother in the choices, the choices to love beyond yourself, the sacrifice that comes with friendship, the nurturing of an arm across a shoulder, the carrying of beauty within you, the permission for Me to care for you, to pour love into your heart so that the ripple of my love continues.
A waterfall begins with a drop, and then a cascade, a drifting through quiet places, a collection until the drops pour past, all together. Mothering happens in the combination of Me holding you in my hands and letting my fingers open a bit to let you pour out what I give.
You can only mother from what I give.
Mothering is a collection of hopes for the future, a belief in good things and the willingness to go to the hard places for those you love. It is the shepherding of children, the gathering of expectation for a future that is to come.
It is faith in possibility for people beyond yourself.
To mother is to press in and give out and never give up. It is to hold on tight and let go, all at once. It is to walk beside and listen close and not fall away, even though the pain comes and it is hard to stay.
To mother is to stay.
And the staying isn’t what you think it looks like sometimes. It is the supporting of the one you hold close while believing it isn’t always you who knows the way.
In mothering, without Me, you don’t know the way.
To mother is to trust and laugh and cry and wave good-bye. It is to come again, despite rejection. It is to provide, when you feel you have nothing to give. It is to look beyond yourself for strength and feel frail and helpless and fall and believe that you will be caught so that you can lift your knees and see what is before you, the Son.
Mothering is not just about bearing a child. It can be that but it is not just that. You mother through loving whom I bring your way. Come on, daughter, look whom I bring.
http://www.gatherministries.com/loop
So, I really didn’t want to do this blog today. It’s a hard one for me. I tried to do something easier, lighter…anything but this, but it was insistent…
The past few weeks I have found myself in conversations with 6 or 7 grieving mothers. Mothers grieving, angry, disappointed, hurting, ashamed over the loss of their children. All different stories, all the same feelings.
I know those feelings well. I wrote the following piece a few years ago about my own loss – I began the grieving process in 2006, 9 years into my loss of everything I ever loved, and that work continues every day. I am sharing this in hopes it may help someone going through similar pain.
💔
I try to clean up
pick up pieces of myself
from all over the frozen ground
Who knew hearts can turn into
Slivers of glass
dangerous to handle
Slice my fingers
I rub tears from my eyes
and find toxic rivers
Red flows
Staining all of life
Small killing shards everywhere
Thousands
Maybe millions
They stick to the inside of my chest
My throat
Puncture my lungs
Settle in my stomach
as I try to eat breakfast
It’s getting harder and harder to speak
To breathe
To stand
I fall face first into a pool
Of freezing water
The glass becomes ice
Eventually I crawl out of the water
but the ice remains
a solid block I live with
for 9 years
Containment my highest priority
Walking dead
until that box breaks open
I begin to grieve
and begin slowly melting
Fusing shattered pieces
absorbing them into
the fabric of my living
Im still working on it
Still looking for the fire of love
to refine the gold
Scars show the hearts broken places
for glimmers of light to shine through
As grieving begins it’s healing work
And I become human
for the first time
❤️
AL
I have no quick fixes, or advice, here. Just a thought of hope, of choosing to stand strong in love and the blessings mothing brings. Go deep with your grief. Nurture yourself. Allow yourself to heal. Never forget:
Love always wins….
photo sources @ www.pinterest.com
hammock time
The breeze –
Takes the pages of my thoughts
Ruffles the edges
Carries them through the air
Without a worry
Without a care
Scattering my secrets
Sowing my life
http://dorindaduclos.com/2015/04/23/the-breeze/
Night Owl Poetry ©2015 Dorinda Duclos Used with permission
Thoughts float in and out
Abstract
In the silence
Whatever is there can come…and go
You come…You go
I am still as the breeze sways the hammock
The blue sky
the trees the sounds of summer
You come…You go
I flow with the river
No hurry
No worry
Allowing God to lead
Allowing the universe to help me
You come…You go
Allowing all things to be how they should be
Allowing life to be as it is
Allowing everything to be grace
Allowing my lips to sing gratitude
Music floats around me Slipping in and out
You come…You go
Allowing strength to rebuild
Allowing the empty to be filled
So it comes
So it goes
I lay down and sleep in peace
for all good things
done, gone and to come
You have come…You have gone
I am
still
🔹
AL
listen to Simon & Garfunkel sing Bridge Over Troubled Waters http://youtu.be/jjNgn4r6SOA
photo sources at www.pinterest.com
sing on
What do you cling to when the waves roll over
your little boat of life?
When the sound drains out of your days,
what still echoes long into the night?
When you cross over the river
what do you still have in your pockets—
a key to something broken, foreign coins,
a medal on a ribbon, inscribed with silence?
What does it profit you— this world,
its flash and sparkle, to weigh yourself
with its precious coals,
and lose the light you are?
If you are God’s love song,
what is there to your life but singing?
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
We are given many gifts
over our lifetimes.
Gifts are heaped upon us.
Every day we receive.
The way we acknowledge these gifts,
the way we receive them,
the counting of the gifts,
awareness in each breath,
our most important choice.
One insight brings us life as
grace or prison.
Heaven or hell
is bound up in gratitude.
I have had many strange and wonderful gifts
received over my life,
so far.
Some took me a long time to recognize the gift within,
some I’m still searching.
Yet this knowledge,
this ability to see,
to choose to see,
the glory in the grey,
stars in the night sky,
there is good in all I receive,
has been the best gift
of all.
Life’s cup runs over.
The path is lined with glittering diamonds.
Even darkest skies are bright with twinkling stars.
AL
Listen to Billie Holiday sing Come Rain or Come Shine http://youtu.be/RL_P-gHxI3Y
photo sources at www.pinterest.com
hello, again!
A few weeks ago I took a break. I truly had no idea if I would return here. I was ok with that – it’s a lovely body of work.
I enjoyed my break, a few times I thought about it…mainly I didn’t….
Over the past three or four days I keep getting a recurring message, ‘speak to the dry bones’. (Haven’t totally worked that out yet…in fact, I’m at sea on it – I welcome any thoughts on it…)
Then, yesterday, I got the message in my soul…time to start again – return and build – and so, here I am. Not really sure where it’s going to go…feels a lot different from my first post 4+ years ago. There are lots of new things going on in my life. Lots of things being moved and removed. Interesting times for me, hard things, as always, still, there is the same, consistent hand of faith holding me, guiding me, urging me on, keeping me on the path of love, joy and peace. The world is a hard, broken place to live in, but deep inside each of us lives the key to overcome the world. I believe that completely.
Thank you for reading my words. Thank you for being a part of my life. Thank you for understanding, or even mis-understanding my thoughts. It’s all good stuff!
Welcome to my adventure!
Love and kisses,
Amy
Wisdom cries out in the street;
at the busiest corner she raises her voice:
“I will pour out my thoughts to you.”
—Proverbs 1.20, 21, 23
I listen.
Amid the clatter and chatter
of my fears and fantasies,
the rattle and traffic of this world
the trip wire pitch, the push,
the drive for the deal
to buy me and sell me—
I listen to your soft voice
humming beneath worry and duty,
steady, its ocean of silence,
its moon of light,
the nearest murmur,
no argument, no decree,
no foreign words, no hard words,
no words,
but wind in grass,
saying all I need to know,
flowing water,
a river poured out in me
to drink, to bathe,
to lie in and float
to your sea.
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
listen to Neil Diamond sing Hello Again http://youtu.be/ZnbMHkiIGwk
Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com
I’ll meet you there…
A lone bird slips through the air.
You do not have to explain yourself.
The beating of your heart
is one with the vast, wordless song of the stars,
the great hum of the world.
Rivers murmur praise,
deserts and oceans chant their meditations,
cities recite their industrious psalms;
and in your cell, unheard, unknown,
the mystery of heaven unfurls
in your silence.
No one knows your place,
no one.
No one knows your precious belonging.
We can only believe,
or err.
The marigold by the roadside
never knows.
But it is true.
Your only work is to come to trust.
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹
It’s not just that when one door closes, another door opens.
When one door closes, Amy, choirs burst into chorus, orchestras orchestrate, bugles bugle, marching bands march, dogs catch Frisbees, cats “chow, chow, chow,” pigs fly, and 10,000 new doors open.
Kind of makes you want a door to close, huh?
Whoohoooo!
The Universe
🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹🔹
I will be taking a break from this blog🔹not sure how long🔹maybe forever🔹lots of beauty in the past 1,000+ posts if you are interested 🔹wishing love, life, music & much happiness to all who come here🔹as well as all who don’t🔹
AL💞
8🔹18🔹15 AD
life: acoustic & amplified 