Friendship

Take My Hand

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adult aged baby care

~for Peter & Mickey

Gulls drop down from a darkening sky —
knowing the land is temporary — sky
their true home. As they fly away again

I walk the sands of shells and time changing
from day into dark into day again- changing
is the flux of dying and living and dying

in this one lifetime — A heart-child cries
in the dark hours of storm and shadow
reaches — toward the shimmering-sparkling

lights shinning on a new horizon – those
bright-built heart diamonds of love light
answer the cry with a gentle-soft whisper —

Come, baby girl, they say, take my hand.
You don’t have to be afraid, storms passing
and a blazing new sunrise is coming soon.

 

~Photo by icon0.com on Pexels.com

 

 

Adventure Days

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scenic view of mountains during dawn

 

 

“Awake, Oh Sleeper,
and arise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.”
~Ephesians 5:14

 

 

 

 

We fall into the place of forgetting
how precious the living is, the deep joy
of ocean breeze across heated skin,
the sound of a bird chirping, singing
gratitude for Grace and sunlight, life
a precious flowing river ever changing

us. Most people, falling into dark sleeping
memories that plague our hearts losses
with all that was, is gone, the past “we”
no longer the “we” of now. These quiet hours
alone in desperation, crying to our Maker
until Mercy pours light and hope and love

down from the heavens. Then, a friend comes
and brings new Adventure Days of hope,
bright laughter, we are playing at life again
like a young child unaware of time, moving
into a new us, a new future, a new phase
of living, growing, becoming whole – Reborn.

These are the gifts we give from deep heart places
where God shines treasure and hope and love
outward, from within us, until everywhere we look
there is gleaming joy and the birds are singing —
Awake, Oh Sleeper, Awake! Rejoice and Live!

 

 

~Photo by Simon Matzinger on Pexels.com

in the air of bliss

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I read Hafiz — No —-
I absorb Hafiz
as I have absorbed Rilke, Rumi, Gibran
as I have soaked up Christian Scripture,
The Upanishads, The Bhagavad Gita, The Sun.

You — singing to me
asking me to dance
for years now — forever.
Yes — are you ready?

Do you think I am finally
brave enough to take your hand
step away from the ground —
There is no longer earth beneath my feet
anyway. I have been falling in you
for years —
Do you think I am
finally?

Yes. I would love to dance with you.
Forever in your embrace
groundless and free.
Movement unfolding
in the air of bliss.

 

~September 2019, Myrtle Beach, SC

A New Song

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bare trees against sky during sunset

~for Mickey 12/2019

 

The old man tells me of his friend (and I am his friend)
as we drive home from dinner.  He falls to weeping
over the buddy he sang with in the church quartet
all those many years ago.

His friend died young, aged 48, and he stopped
singing then (at 72 he sings to me as we drive).
The pain of sad loss trembles from him, the words
and images fall into my lap for safe keeping — this
is a heart opening into hearing as I whisper the normal
“I’m sorry” and “I know it still hurts” because that is what
one does —

But I want say — “I am listening” and “I will put this
in a poem” Your heart — THIS big with love —
“I will save it forever for you in a poem.” But
I only whisper the normal solaces one gives,
watch his tears fall and listen as he shivers —
His frail voice singing a song about a Lighthouse
as I take his aged hand in mine
across the center console of the car.

There —
In the night drive home after dinner
in the shimmer and melody on air
and the spring of tears trembling down —

The ghost of his friend rides with us
on through the dark night
as hands both living and dead
reach out and touch —

And a poem is planted, unfurls —
Grows into a new song.

 

~Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

A Stranger Who Is a Friend: Seeking the Beloved

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Glass3

“What you seek is seeking you.”  ~Rumi

 

A stranger who is a friend I’m just now meeting brings me a gift. He reaches in his pocket – reaches his hand out to me – places a piece of the living world in my hand. It is warm from being in his pocket, from the heat of his energy. It fits my hand perfectly as I stare at it and then into it and through it.

An opaque beauty of swirling movement and lines flows into my vision. The warmth of endowed energy moves into me along with the images: first, an eye looks back at me: then, an outline of a bird: then, a volcanic landmass: then, a riverbed that explodes into the Universe twirling. And, finally, in it’s deepest secret revealing, what does this gifted treasure show me? Love.

This love so bright my heart beats deeper and my lips form smiles. Laughter breaks free and moves out my mouth. This love is the same voice of love in my ear all week saying that my favorite Shiva Lingham stone is to be gifted to this person when we meet. I explain this to the stranger who is a friend as he sits down on my couch.  I do not explain that I have spent a week chanting and praising and holding this stone in my hand so it would hold deep the energy of love for him when gifted.  I take the stone from it’s sacred space on my table  and I reach out my hand to his and give him this gift. Love.

The Universe as space and sky unfolds it’s magic and pours it’s love on the ground below. Metaphorically, this love is the ground where strangers become friends in the unlikeliest of ways. It is the ground that grows our greatest human possibilities and capabilities, the ground that fosters the seeds of compassion and giving in such a way that others and the world are made better by this garden. Human vulnerability and honesty are the water feeding thirsty plants so they may unfold, bloom, and burst wide into bright-colored, rich-scented flowers.

This garden crop at harvest is one of peace, generosity, encouragement, and friendship in sublimely spiritual ways. We grow and flower under the tutelage of love. She is our teacher and the deepest vast river and earth of our being.

We are magically superhuman (pure Spirit, even!) when we love ourselves and others with this Divine Love of non-judgement and non-condtioning. But this love requires two deep human offerings for maturation: we must sacrifice falsehood and safety. The irony — that in sharing our true vulnerability with others and maintaining a deep core commitment to honesty with ourselves and with others we move past the confines of self and into the joy of love that is the Divine.

The dichotomies and duality of good and bad, perfect and imperfect, enough and not enough seem to lose their strangulation hold over us; suddenly we breathe a little deeper, there is room for movement and flexibility, the control that once made us feel safe seems a lie and a bad joke somehow. We are beginning to understand the meaning of freedom. And this movement from captivity into freedom begins with a simple question: What are you seeking?

Or, translate the question into it’s deeper variations: What are you looking for? when you look at yourself, others, the Universe, the Divine. Whatever you are seeking is also seeking you? You will see what you expect to see. You will find what you think is there. What do your beliefs tell you? And how many of those beliefs still work for you? Do they bring you fear or pain, or do they take you to a place where love, joy, freedom are the common experience?

Take a slight pause to consider the questions…a minor shift in focus, one small off-step in perceptive point of view … are you seeking a stranger that is a friend? Are you open to finding the Beloved in the faces and animals and the world around you? Is a stone a stone — or can you open your eyes a little wider, look a little deeper — to the life and flow and love that hides within it? If you can pause and consider the questions a new expansion of your being will come. Suddenly, the journey opens wide a path in front of you and what you have been seeking meets you in the garden of life.

 

Glass1

for Matthew

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man-on-stairs-joana-kruse

 

How do I tell you to a stranger?
Do I start with that goofy walk – yours alone
Or the quick smile, always with a slight laugh,
Tilting head and blue sparkling eyes?
Or, the truth when we met –
though I denied it then –
that you looked to young to be the GSM,
that you weren’t what I expected the GSM
of a large store to be.
Your steadfast declaration –
that you were worthy of the spot:
“I can handle it!”
As if convincing me of this in some way
mattered. To you

I was “your angel” come to help.
The proclamation over and over
again. NOW we could do what must
be done to turn it around, grow
your success. I remember that night
in the bar (your words still ringing
in my ear). Us. We. Laughing, agreeing
in unison with the crowd of people
that we would move forward, clean up
the debris, build a stronger better future
together. You – the age of my daughter –
twenty-eight and electric with youth,
hope, drive. But gray shadows circled
even then, ethereal smoke twirling

at the edges of a dream. I spent
ninety-four days by your side before
fate bade me leave, warned me
that the darkening skies
and nightmare abyss would
claim you.

Seven hundred and thirty days later.
I look down At your face,
cradled by silk cushions in the coffin,

Gray and still like a deep, dark storm
blowing distant Over the ocean.
Your smile missing. I remember

a singular moment of time, mere weeks,
a few months on the calendar,
when kindred souls met, laughed,
and dreamed. Happily planning
a future that fate knew
would never come.

Photography Prints

(RIP Matthew Sayers 2014)

Photo Credit: Man on Stairs by Joana Kruse