Emily

How lovely it is,
Emily’s words to read now,
Filling me with joy.

If one tree falls there,
Not seen, but it had a life,
It can be enough.

Lighter now am I,
Not in body but in heart,
I can fly away!

Not to leave for good,
Just to migrate, to explore,
Coming back in spring.

Spring back in the hills,
Blooming trees and daffodils,
Beauty overwhelms.

This is simply joy,
Overwhelming in the heart,
Sitting in the quiet.

So the mind does drift,
From the sky to lowest earth,
It is all the same.

“They might not need me,
But they might” I take into
My soul so glad now.

My soul with open
Arms, stands ajar to see
Unexpected love.

A wounded deer and
grieving heart can leap highest,
So I’ve read today.

Emily was here,
Leaving hope for all of us,
Opening her soul.

Grateful are we for
This day, unexpected doors
Open to the sky.

Emily Dickinson Homestead

Emily Dickinson was not well known in her time, and yet she created anyway. She had to, because writing was clearly one of the biggest parts of her purpose here on earth, to communicate these words in such a unique form that they now impact our lives today.

These words and the quotes below were posted by Christie Leigh Babirad. Thank you, Christie.

Daily Intention

In these days filled with stress about moving, not being able to control the process myself because of a bad back and constant fatigue, I come each morning seeking inspiration.

Visitor’s footfalls are like medicine, they heal the sick.

—  Bantu proverb

Here’s the true secret of life. We mostly do everything over and over. . . . I love ritual and repetition. Without them, I would be a balloon with a slow leak.

—  Anne Lamott in Stiches: A Handbook on Meaning, Hope and Repair

True happiness comes from the joy of deeds well done, the zest of creating things new.

— Antoine de Saint-Exupery

When you no longer burn with love, others will die of the cold.

—  St. Vincent de Paul

To see takes time, like to have a friend takes time.

—  Georgia O’Keefe

Intention

I set my intention to stay spiritually grounded.

Within all the spiritual traditions, short and sweet wisdom abounds: from mantras and blessings to 12-step slogans and proverbs, and more. As philosopher George Santayana once said: “To be brief is almost a condition of being inspired.” In this blog, I will take up the quest for small seeds of spiritual wisdom, which can be found everywhere if we keep our eyes and ears open.

Frederic Brussat, Short & Sweet Spirituality Blog

In the end, everyone is our teacher, on one leverl or another. The child is our teacher, our friends, our family, the stranger on the street…Every thought that bubbles up in our minds can teach us things about ourselves, if we are able to listen.

—  David Cooper in Silence, Simplicity and Solitude

Intention to Stay Grounded

I have written my 10-minute timed writing for the writing group. To continue a blog of the new story, I will begin collecting the inspirational quotes from any source – Bible, poetry, essays, philosopher – that mean something to me.

I want to counterbalance the focus of news on bad things, things that make their audience watch.

First, appropriately, I remember “In the beginning…” But weirdly I was thinking “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

But I didn’t remember that that sentence was the beginning of John. Hah! Never associated that with my dad, John, before. “And that was the beginning of John.”

I am so involved with looking at the lives of these ancestors that it is a challenge to both honor their lives and stories and to be here now.

Also, it feels as if I need to play in the world which is now a world of speed, social media, zoom zoom zoom! But I want mostly to sit quietly in the woods, rather in a meadow near the woods, warm, comfy, by a meandering stream.

I Need Inspiration

This is Now the Day

This is now the day? The day for what? I wake up, make coffee, read the ghastly news about women fighting each other in a Bed and Bath place, new vaccines but how will I get another Moderna? In this moment, the beginning of this now, all feels heavy, impossible, just not the loving, kind Nirvana I want to live in.

Ok. I understand that is not realistic, although growing up in a church with people, at least surfacy, trying to be kind and compassionate, I do think it’s possible to try to live in a loving way. I was going to say “Christian,” but then of course I find it hard to let go of all those people in Christian guises who say I don’t have rights, I am not equal. What would it have been to grow up Black or Asian or anything other than WASP? I can see that every moment I would have been opened to criticism, hate, ridicule, despicable actions by white people who are afraid of something.

Our differences can be such a beautiful thing, yet the “majority” feels threatened by whatever minority is around. It would happen to girls in an all-white school who would judge others by whatever criteria felt comfortable.

This is all just useless blather to me. The reality is that I need to focus each day on being the kind, compassionate person in the world I want to see. To do that I need to breathe deeply, let go of anger and my own fears, listen to inspiring things, begin the Now of Today rejoicing that I am still alive along with so many I love.

No wonder the Bible is one of the most read books in history. We all need to read inspirational things, whether from Buddhist texts or the Koran or the Bible – wherever we read the truth of the Golden Rule: love each other as you would like to be loved.

Ahhh. I breathe even as I write. All is not lost. There are psalms and parables and beautiful poetry and words of beauty and images of truth and beauty that can uplift just by reading them. Ahh, I breathe again. This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be thankful! I lift up mine eyes to the hills. From whence cometh my help? My help cometh from the Lord who made heaven and earth.

Seeking words of inspiration, as remembered…

A quote attributed to Emerson
For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness.

Gerry Jampolsky’s words that
Love is letting go of fear.

Just Be

New story like old,
Not seen, not heard, why be here?
No reason, really.

No meaning, ok,
Just a life like little ants,
Carrying our load.

But the ants do good,
Even when they just move earth,
They aerate the soil.

As they live, they give,
Not their goal but just the facts,
Some will crush them, dead!

Such is life today,
Just by staying here, breathing,
As I live, I give.

I do not know how,
But it’s not my job to know,
Just to live in now.

Good! I like to know,
That there is a purpose here,
I can just sail through.

That is good to know,
Pressure gone, just be an ant,
Do your thing, you’re good.

Breathe Deeply In Of Life

It is the first day of a two-month Natalie Goldberg online class, The Way of Writing: Opening the Practice of the Wild Mind, offered by Shambala Publications.

The writing practices of Natalie Goldberg have changed my life on several occasions. My brother, Dave, a fine writer himself, gave me a copy of Natalie’s book, Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within, shortly after it came out in paperback, 1986? I have always loved writing, but I didn’t think he had noticed!

In the mid-90’s I was part of a magical writing group of women in Marin County, north of San Francisco. My memory is that we met every week for five years, but memories can be foggy. What is accurate is that that writing group was one of the most important chapters in my life, let alone my writing life. As suggested in a Natalie Goldberg book, we each wrote for 10 minutes on the same topic. We each then read what we had written with no comment, negative or positive.

What an incredible safety that provided. We seven or eight women became deeply bonded. We began to trust one another as well as ourselves. It was really not about the writing; it was about the inner lives and personal growth of a group of then 40-50-year-old professional women. Did I mention we were mostly lesbians? Living as a minority is hard for anyone, most especially Black, Latinex, Asian American women, but it was also an often painful struggle for women who grew up in the 50’s when it was still criminal to be gay.

Which brings me back to today, nearing the end (I hope!) of a life-altering pandemic, writing for the first time with Natalie. I am shocked to find there are more than 2000 other people in the class, across this country as well as in other parts of the world. But as we have had to adapt to so many changes in these challenging times, I am sure that there will be great life lessons as well as great writing pleasure and insight.

 

Beauty Out There Lies

From a Forgotten Post, Spring, 2019

Patterns of the light
Filter through the leafy green
Beauty out there lies.

Deep within I find,
Peace as well which dwells within
Hiding in the dark.

Feel the gratitude,
Let go worries, dark concerns
Open to the light.

Such is also truth,
Letting sun rise, seeing dawn,
All is not the night.

In this day of spring,
Passing light show gives me joy,
Let it shine within.

When the darkness grabs,
Slip away, just let it go
Heaven is still here.

Babies birth this day,
Someone dies but someone’s born,
Always is it so.

Hold your whole self close,
Loving weakness with the strength,
All belongs to you.

Joining hands we know,
In our circle love breaks through,
Shining through us all.

Do not go alone,
Many need your heart as well
Walking in this life.