7 Dec 2009

conventionality is not morality

Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to assail the last. To pluck the mask from the face of the Pharisee, is not to lift an impious hand to the Crown of Thorns.
These things and deeds are diametrically opposed: they are as distinct as is vice from virtue. Men too often confound them: they should not be confounded: appearance should not be mistaken for truth; narrow human doctrines, that only tend to elate and magnify a few, should not be substituted for the world-redeeming creed of Christ. There is - I repeat it - a difference; and it is a good, and not a bad action to mark broadly and clearly the line of separation between them.
-Currer Bell aka Charlotte Bronte

6 Dec 2009

a piece of sky

Tell me where
Where is it written
What is it I'm meant to be?
That I can't dare
To have the chance to pick the fruit of every tree,
Or have my share of every sweet-imagined possibility?

It all began the day I found..
That from my window I could only see
A piece of sky.
I stepped outside and looked around.
I never dreamed it was so wide
Or even half as high.

The time had come
To try my wings
And even thought it seemed at any moment I could fall,
I felt the most,
Amazing things,
The things you can't imagine
if you've never flown at all.

Though it's safer to stay on the ground,
Sometimes where danger lies
There the sweetest of pleasures are found.
No matter where I go,
There'll be memories that tug at my sleeve,
But there will also be
More to question, yet more to believe..

The more I live - the more I learn.
The more I learn - the more I realize
The less I know.
Each step I take -
Each page I turn -
Each mile I travel only means
The more I have to go.

What's wrong with wanting more?
If you can fly - then soar!
With all there is - why settle for
just a piece of sky?

27 Nov 2009

bereavement and legacy

My mother died September 12, 2001 of cancer. My great-grandma a year later at the age of 92. On the 15th my grandmother suffered the same fate as my mother in a hospice in Kelowna. I just got back from visiting her. Just got back from another birthday spent with a dying loved one. Birth and death meet again. It's hard to comprehend.

My grandmother is an amazing person. She is extremely humorous, light hearted, down to earth and most of all very loving. Everyone who has met my grandma has felt loved and the comfort of her generous hospitality. Grandma's life has not been free from suffering. She has endured trials of many kinds, and what amazes me about her is her constant joy and concern for others. She seems to always be stable. I felt the same about my mother. It was as though they had the secret to contentment - something I've been longing for my whole 26 years! :) I didn't know you could find it.

Being with Grandma, talking of life, memories, family, etc. brought me to a deep appreciation not only for domestic life (who knew?! ..who am I kidding, we all know domestic life in it's greatest form is amazing) but for family and simplicity. She has lived a full life, not because she has traveled the world or learned 6 languages or earned a PhD. She had a family and she loved them. She had fun with them. She grew with them. I watch home videos and remember and think, "Yes, it has been quite full!"

My Grandma was very close to my mother. She had her at 16. I think of Gilmore Girls. She told me two weeks ago that my Mom was the best daughter anyone could ever have. She said my Mom seemed to be born with a deep wisdom that she had even as a child. I can recognize this. As I said, my Mom appeared to not only know the secret to contentment, but also hold the key of freedom from the greater societal opinion and confinements therein. My Mom traveled alone with her friend when she was 14. She taught classes in her teens. She studied art at College and painted. She studied guitar and played and sang. She wrote poetry. She danced. She got her nursing degree. She loved the outdoors. She loved life! So far I see many similarities with me. Then my Mom got married, young. She was 22 when she married my father and 23 when she had me! If I followed in her footsteps I should be coming up on my third kid by now.

As I have written in previous posts, I seem to have a distaste for the traditional nuclear family life. But not because itself is undesirable or bad, but because I have seen it abused, and often miserable, confining and restricting. I believe it doesn't have to be this way. I've seen this in my family. Individuals make a family. Therefore, my mother being her independent, wonderful self continued as such. She had sleepovers in her 40's. She continued to paint, play, write, sing, etc. She was free and still independent (interdependent.. as we all are, aren't we?) She was also an amazing Mom (and cultivated the same freedom and love for life and others in us). Mom and artist. Mom and nurse. Mountaineer. Nutritionist. Counsellor. Friend.

I thank God that I was able to witness a woman who was not bound to a role. My grandmother said this, and I can't help but agree with her that my Mom was exceptional. I could really weep everytime I think about what I'm missing with her gone (and now with my wonderful grandmother gone).

So this is the legacy I am a part of. I'm the next woman up, with a life that so far looks quite different from the ones before me. I'm up for the challenge in learning exceptional love, contentment and liberation.


Great-Grandma Bodie
1910-2002


Grandma
1943-2009


Mom
1959-2001

21 Nov 2009

clive on grief

"Part of every misery is, so to speak, the misery's shadow or reflection: the fact that you don't merely suffer but have to keep on thinking about the fact that you suffer. I not only live each endless day in grief, but live each day thinking about living each day in grief."

14 Nov 2009

on marriage

Any intelligent woman who reads the marriage contract, and then goes into it, deserves all the consequences. -Isadora Duncan

When it comes down to it the thought of marriage frightens me. It frightens me because it is all responsibility to convention, roles, expectations and (apparent) practicality. I am desperately in love with freedom. I feel as though I could live forever on family, friendships and occasional flirtation. However, there are some moments when my mind wonders on this idea of commitment. And I realize that not only is it somewhat dazzling, but I indeed exist and thrive within commitment already. Amongst other examples I think specifically of my brother and sister and how their love and commitment to me has been all freeing, life-giving and mostly lovely. So it is the idea that marriage is not freeing is what keeps me from considering it.

Again, when I think about marriage as a part of my life I realize that it seems to me that it is not marriage I want (for as I said I have commitment already from others, and I'm failing to see other positive reasons for marriage (or examples of)) but romance. And not romance as it may be traditionally understood either. Not the chivalrous kind but the kind that is equal and mutually understood. I seem to believe that there exists a process of shared enchantment where in seeing glimpses of the bare soul there is desire to know and reveal. That it becomes both choice and desire to set the other free in the rawest of states. That freedom and love are the ultimate goals for the other. If this did exist, this I could commit to.. for it is free.

I would never wish to gain my independence from any man, nor my economic or social security. I am not in need of one to give me my greatest value or affirmation. I desire no spiritual covering or adventure coach. The thought of bearing children does not come with a natural understanding to me. I feel as far removed from the image of a women in floral-print dress in the kitchen as any man would. No, these things I am not looking for. I desire life, love and freedom (freedom perhaps from the conventional/traditional ideas).. and if this exists in a commitment with a man.. then of course, I welcome it (or welcome the consideration).

8 Nov 2009

grief

7 Nov 2009

Infidel

Infidel (literally, 'one without faith') is what Ayaan Hirsi Ali has professed herself as and has plastered in large all-cap letters on her recent autobiography. A brave woman as association with such a name puts her in direct threat of Islamic radicals.

I have just finished reading her fabulous autobiography where Ayaan details her life as she moved throughout Eastern Africa and the Middle East specifically Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia and Kenya. She places emphasis on how Islam shaped and changed her life, then to a greater extent how it affects it's followers and finally, Islam as a worldview that influences the world. Her story is all horrific, fascinating and thought-provoking. I winced through it as I read about her experience with female genital mutilation and the treatment of women in most Islamic countries. How can you leisurely read about a girl of 14 begging her husband who is holding a knife to her scar (the result of circumcision) not to cut her open so he can penetrate her? He so kindly got her cut open at a hospital instead of doing it himself. Such experiences fill her life's story. It is horrifying.

Ayaan also describes the political and social environments of the many countries she lived in. The reign of Siad Barre, the battle and ultimate destruction of Mogadishu (think Black Hawk Down). The rise of the Brotherhood of Islam and their influence in the world. Finally, she relays how she escaped an arranged marriage and fled to Holland. There she stayed independently where she worked factory jobs, learned Dutch and worked herself through school, gaining a masters degree in political science. Her observations and description of western culture from architecture to sex to philosophies is direct and eye-opening. We hardly comprehend our own culture until the other appears. Ayaan made her way into Dutch parliament and fought for women's rights, various immigrant policies, etc. all the while publically rising up as a fierce critic of Islam.

Together with Theo van Gogh, (a filmmaker in Amsterdam) Ayaan made a short film called Submission (you can watch it on youtube). The movie simply and artfully communicated the oppression of women in Islam. In November, 2004 Theo van Gogh was chased down on the streets of Amsterdam, shot, had his throat slit and was stabbed numerous times by an Islamic radical. With the last stab his killer attached a note onto Theo's chest addressed to Ayaan threatening that she would be next. She has since gone into hiding and is residing now in the U.S.
I arrived in Amsterdam 6 months later and I remember walking with some friends in Dam Square and being told of the huge demonstration that had happened there for Theo van Gogh in reaction to this terrible incident months before. This was undoubtedly a big deal.

Today Ayaan is known as one of Europe's most controversial political figures, speaking directly against the detriments of Islam. My natural overly tolerant Canadian tendencies winced at reading her harsh accusations and criticisms of Islam in her book. She has not been one to withhold her controversial opinion and in turn has rose in popularity as one of the most loved and hated feminist voices of today. I admire her strength and courage.

I love autobiographies generally. I love hearing people's stories, learning their lives, sharing and relating to their thoughts and experiences. What I love about Ayaan is her honesty and directness. I felt as though I have had the honour of being taken into her confidence and share a deeply personal journey. She wrote so candidly, not withholding details that one might easily hide as embarrassing if not unimportant to the story. But Ayaan has simply lived and told her story. She is a product of and now a fighter against religious abuse.
I recommend this book as one that has deeply touched and taught me. One can learn much from it's personal journey, history and perhaps challenging (or other) point of view from a fellow fighter for social justice.

In Ayaan's sharp criticisms towards Islam fundamentalism I couldn't help but find parallels with fundamentalist Christianity. Yes, evil is done in almost any name. I felt an uneasiness thinking back on the Christian education I so often received growing up with a (too often solely) strict emphasis to 'save the lost!' (as thought that were my job in the first place. Didn't Jesus come to do just that?) and all the detriments attached to an over simplistic, non-relational, partially understood 'mandate of love.'
Ravi Zacharias declares that one cannot judge a religion based on it's abuses but rather on what it professes. Now we're getting onto a whole other topic. :) I believe religions are flawed and often harmful. They are human made. And though it may be harder for me to separate a religion from it's abuses I am most interested in what religions profess. Ayaan makes it clear that it is a critical question to ask, for in reality it affects us all.

30 Sept 2009

jo

Jo: Oh, Beth, truly, I don't know if I could ever be good like Marmee. I rather crave violence. If only I could be like Father and go to war and stand up to the lions of injustice.

Beth: I'm sure Marmee does in her own way.

Jo: Yes.. But I want to do something different. I don't know what it is yet, but I'm on the watch for it.

Beth: You'll find it Jo.

--------

Jo: Well, of course Aunt March prefers Amy over me. Why shouldn’t she? I’m ugly and awkward and I always say the wrong things. I fly around throwing away perfectly good marriage proposals. I love our home, but I’m just so fitful and I can’t stand being here! I’m sorry, I’m sorry Marmee. There’s just something really wrong with me. I want to change, but I – I can’t. And I just know I’ll never fit in anywhere.

Marmee: Oh, Jo. Jo, you have so many extraordinary gifts; how can you expect to lead an ordinary life? You’re ready to go out and – and find a good use for your talent. Tho’ I don’t know what I shall do without my Jo. Go, and embrace your liberty. And see what wonderful things come of it.

29 Sept 2009

not to mention everyone speaks english!

What is funny most about being home is calling this 'home.'
I am one of the few people in Calgary who can say, 'born and raised.' Weird (i feel quite estranged from all that statement entails). Weird seeing Calgary now as i do; quite corporate, fast paced, money-driven, extremely materialistic - the sad state of many western cities, but not all (or as much). i'm quite sick of blackberry's, labels, big trucks, hummers, etc. I miss Winnipeg. Hippies all of them. :) (not all of them, but diversity is more easily seen). I miss Lakeside - our quiet hideaway in the mountains. Freshly made granola at 'buns by the lake.' I miss Otterburne.
Nonetheless, this is where i have lived most of my life save the last 6 years or so. So i come back (from Korea) not knowing what to expect or what i would feel. It's familiar yet unfamiliar. I know how to get places... I had a church here once, and a fairly large community of friends.
Over the past few weeks i have been amazed as i've gone about my days in this familiar yet unfamiliar place. I go to Kensington and order a shwarma from Sam! The same man who's served me Sam's special for years. Still smiling brightly, still calling me, 'my friend!' I couldn't stop smiling. How strange. I move away for years... experience various places, people and communities.. and things still exist here as they did!
I'm amazed at how i run into people on the streets that i know! All the time! That i will recognize someone from high school at a coffee shop, or an elderly person will come talk to me because they know my dad. Calgary is not that small. I guess it is.
Today i went to the Doctor. I didn't think he would remember me. He did. Asked all about my life, how i was doing, if i was married. Advised me that i shouldn't get married to a man under 40 and talked more to me about personal things than what i went there for. It was nice. He knew my mom, well.
These experiences are strange to me. I am not used to familiar. I am not used to being known. I think it's a good thing.

27 Sept 2009

because i also feel large

Father, I bring thee not myself,—
That were the little load;
I bring thee the imperial heart
I had not strength to hold.

The heart I cherished in my own
Till mine too heavy grew,
Yet strangest, heavier since it went,
Is it too large for you?

-Emily Dickinson

24 Sept 2009

Leaving the garden by Miriam Meinders

We all want to be good. We are heavily invested in our identity as good, well-meaning people. This accounts for the appeal of the development narrative as it is usually told: go to exotic places, meet interesting people, and help them. We don't want to know about unfair trade practices or resource exploitation, but we do want to know about how we could fund an orphanage, dig a well for a village or get more African girls in school. It is easier to congratulate ourselves for helping others than to think about how our comfortable position depends on their uncomfortable lives. It is easier psychologically, but it's also easier intellectually. Neither mainstream media nor the various NGOs and development organizations have much reason to complicate the story of the good North (sometimes called the First World) reaching out to help the poor benighted South (sometimes called the Third World).

In Desire for Development: Whiteness, Gender and the Helping Imperative, Barbara Heron, a former development worker, concludes that the "desire for development" is at heart a "profound desire for self." Working in the South can be a path to self-actualization, to a more fully realized life. You can have a meaningful experience, and do good at the same time. If you are troubled that your meaningful experience comes via the suffering of others, you can tell yourself, "Well, at least I'm helping. Or trying to help."

I am being both facetious and non-facetious here. Helping is one of the things humans can and should do for one another. Our species is interdependent, after all. But there are unseen power dynamics at work. Paulette Goudge, a scholar whom Heron quotes, foregrounds the idea of domination rather than the idea of helping:
The more I have reflected on my experiences, the more I have realized the crucial role of notions of white superiority in maintaining the whole structure of global inequality. The aid industry is deeply implicated in these structures.

Rather than acknowledging our participation in structures of domination, however, we would prefer to maintain our innocence. Our innocence is the key to maintaining the moral high ground, and the moral high ground is very dear to the hearts of Northerners (especially if we are white and middle class). It is territory we consider ours by right. It is crucial to our self-concept.

You have to live far removed from the exigencies of survival to believe in the possibilities of your own innocence. That is, the further removed you are from the labour that made your clothes or grew your food, and the less you know about the pipelines bringing the natural gas to your house, the more easily you can convince yourself that life can be pure.

With knowledge comes responsibility, but that responsibility is more than can be borne sometimes, which I take to be the meaning of the story of the expulsion from the Garden of Eden. Once you eat of the Tree of Knowledge, you have indeed been cast out from Paradise. To cling to the notion of your own innocence is a way of trying to get back into the garden. But what if we look around and accept this world as our home - this reality here and now, mixed and troublesome as it is? Would that help us accept our knowledge and our responsibility?

In Ursula Le Guin's short story, "The Shobie's Story," a spaceship crew does a ritual to prepare for a dangerous voyage with experimental technology. One character explains the purpose of the ritual: "'We all use each other,' Oreth said. The ritual says: we have no right to do so; therefore we accept the responsibility for the suffering we cause.'" I suppose this could turn into a source of easy comfort - we could say, "Ah, well, we all use each other, therefore I might as well get what I can out of other people" - but it seems profound to me. There is no living without using and being used, there is no remote safe place from which to maintain one's innocence. If I give up on a fixation with the idea of purity, I am better able to conceive of the possibility of action, I am more willing to embark on a course of trial and error, I have less fear about pushing up against the world with my foolishness and having it push back and show me the error of my ways.

My sense of self can rely less on a static concept of goodness and more on my interdependence with others who need me, and help me, as much as I help them.

16 Sept 2009

random ranting and church shopping OR 'from without'

At this moment i wonder why Christians are often such snobs (how contrary to the religion's foundational values, don't you think?). Why physical appearances are some's sole concern. Why we reject tradition for 'relevance' that weakens in a month's time and excludes more humans than includes in it's 'relevence' (highly ineffective). We all sit around looking beautiful, scanning the room for other beautiful people to use. All the while thinking highly of ourselves and this pious lot of the most humble and spiritual.

I ask why equality is not only unpracticed but completely unconsidered. Why human relationships are encompassed in games and mask-wearing. Why we have forgotten the worth of a critical mind for the sake of mindless pleasure (and self-justification).

... and there's the dichotomies within myself where i look for something ancient yet something new (an 'ancient future'). A rebel trying to find meaning in the traditions i rebel against. Playing the games i detest and judging those who join me. Wanting stability and longing for escape. Needing order in the chaos and chaos in the order. And all the while hoping that there is something bigger than my questions, frustrations, dichotomies and this 'unendurable sense of desire and loss.' Something 'from without.'

28 Jul 2009

such a common bird

I am a lone wolf
A beauty and a beast
Both hunter and hunted
Soft tongue and sharp teeth
I'm toned from my travels yet raw from this road
As I drink from storm puddles
And the stories I'm told
Help me figure this out
Help me figure you in
You're a shadow to me
That I echo when I sing
Help me figure this out
Help me figure you into this simple little melody
I have seen angels
They were sleeping in gutters
They were standing in bank lines
They were jumping from towers
They were calling like seagulls
But nobody heard
Such a beautiful message
From such a common bird
We want freedom for ourselves
But we can't give it to each other
We want peace between nations
Yet we battle with our lovers
We're blinded by billboards
And trying to get ahead
Choking on ambition
And the words left unsaid
All the words left unsaid form a simple little melody
I am a lone wolf
A beauty and a beast
Both hunter and hunted
Soft tongue and sharp teeth
I'm toned from my travels yet raw from this road
As I drink from storm puddles
And the stories I'm told
Help me figure this out
Help me figure you in
You're a shadow to me
That I echo when I sing
Help me figure this out
Help me figure you in

9 Jul 2009

my father's wisdom

"I'm so glad you haven't figured out what you're going to do the rest of your life, yet. It would be so disappointing for us who are a little further in our history, still scratching our butts wondering whats next?" - Papa

18 Jun 2009

my heart and i

ENOUGH ! we're tired, my heart and I.
We sit beside the headstone thus,
And wish that name were carved for us.
The moss reprints more tenderly
The hard types of the mason's knife,
As heaven's sweet life renews earth's life
With which we're tired, my heart and I.

You see we're tired, my heart and I.
We dealt with books, we trusted men,
And in our own blood drenched the pen,
As if such colours could not fly.
We walked too straight for fortune's end,
We loved too true to keep a friend;
At last we're tired, my heart and I.

How tired we feel, my heart and I!
We seem of no use in the world;
Our fancies hang grey and uncurled
About men's eyes indifferently;
Our voice which thrilled you so, will let
You sleep; our tears are only wet:
What do we here, my heart and I?

Yet who complains? My heart and I?
In this abundant earth no doubt
Is little room for things worn out:
Disdain them, break them, throw them by
And if before the days grew rough
We once were loved, used, -- well enough,
I think, we've fared, my heart and I.

-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

25 May 2009

on wisdom

"Wisest is she who knows that she does not know"
- Jostein Gaarder

3 May 2009

fellow wandrers

Unser Leben gleicht der Reise eines Wandrer's in der Nacht;
Jeder hat auf seinem Gleise etwas, was ihm Kummer macht.

Our life is like the journey of a wanderer through the night;
and each one, advancing slowly, knows: deep sorrow is his plight.

29 Apr 2009

two giant fat people

God
and I have become
like two giant fat people living
in a tiny
boat

We
keep bumping into
each other
and laughing.

-Hafiz

25 Apr 2009

looking back

nothing really significant, but i found this in my old files and i completely forgot about it. i left for Korea one month after graduation without really thinking about my decision or knowing what to expect. i've now been here for about 10 months. i can't believe it.

"i'm feeling sad.. and a little anxious. i leave for korea on friday... and have been waiting for this damn visa for almost a month now. that's a month of not working... waiting... preparing... ignoring the fact that i'm leaving again.. and having some amazing times with my family and friends.
i'm packing now. what is this? the unknown i guess is enough to make one feel anxious.. but i've done this many times. could it be that after moving and living in 6 different places the last 6 years is finally taking its toll on me? am i finally feeling the wears and tears of saying good-bye to those i love.. to re-familiarizing myself to those supposed to be familiar at "home?" i don't know... maybe i just feel this is too soon. i haven't soaked up my brother and sister enough... not enough of michelle and hannah.. the lockharts.. not enough of the mountains. and off i go again. to a culture quite unlike mine... to a language i will probably never learn... this usually excites me. maybe my unsettled emotions come from my fear of being alone. for the first time i'm not moving into another community... no ywamers to hug me at first meeting... no old familiar friends... dorm life... no. my own apartment; what a freaky thought!
perhaps i'm just feeling extra nostalgic at the moment. maybe as soon as i get on the plane my heart with leap with excitement again at the adventures ahead."

22 Apr 2009

insufficient content

i feel as though my life is on pause. at this moment i want to go home. home to a home. home to a family. home to beloved nature displayed in its greatest splendor. and home to an unknown future. yes, even that i would accept.
what is contentment? maybe it will never fully be ours. i can't imagine being fully satisfied; can't imagine not wanting more. maybe that's the point.
i find myself in this state filled with joy over the simplest things. colours - like those brilliant reds in the fall. the sky at dusk - a dark but vivid blue. the brilliant pink hundred-petalled flowers generously clustered on rich greenery. the delicate cherry blossoms blooming on dark gnarly branches. and other things like potted plants. designs made from foam and espresso in a warm mug of latte. the chirping of birds on a morning walk and seeing the sun at 9, 10 and 11 free of concrete cover. these things bring me joy. i wish i could dwell with them; be encompassed by colour, songs, warmth and beauty; find comfort in being as they do. (be free from concrete, suits, schedules and money-making.) but i cannot wrap myself in colour as much as i can kill desire. i am an ever longing, ever desiring soul. wanting summer and fall to exist at once, and mourning the death of each brilliant red.

"I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all their toil - this is God's gift to humans." -Ecclesiastes 3:12

if only it were that easy.

4 Apr 2009

"What matters supremely, therefore, is not, in the last analysis, the fact that I know God, but the larger fact which underlies it - the fact that He knows me. I am graven on the palms of His hands. I am never out of His mind. All my knowledge of Him depends on His sustained initiative in knowing me...

There is tremendous relief in knowing that His love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion Him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself, and quench His determination to love me."

-J.I. Packer

31 Mar 2009

...and again

Sonnet CXVI
by William Shakespeare

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love,
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
Oh, no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests.. and is never shaken.
It is the star to every wandering bark
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love is not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come.
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out.. even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

17 Mar 2009

on love

I think it is right and just that all creatures be free. Indeed, that God Himself has ordained the world and our relationship to him in such a manner. Love therefore cannot be coerced, it cannot be conditional, it should not require preference upon another, it must exist strong and true; penetrating all frame, faculty and nature.
Love must be free, for love that is not free is not love at all. In such a state of mind I require that onto others; that they be free. And as apparent dichotomy time and again prove itself the founder of truth, in freedom will exist absolute security. Within this security evolves the greatest form of acceptance, adoration and love for the creature in it's rawest state, as God originally saw fit. It is this that I wait for, and for this that I hope.

1 Mar 2009

If I was free to hold you
I would.
I would kiss you for a
thousand days
and when those were through
I'd kiss you ten thousand more
until we understood
eachother's eyes
dove into our souls
and knew Him
so much better

26 Feb 2009

salt

there is a gnawing at my
heart
it is the sorrows of the world.
why is it that i see your hand
under my feet
and the next day i'm drowning?
was it not you who also
made the sea?
is it you who engulfs me?
and helps me brush the salt off?

7 Feb 2009

my thoughts as described by Charlotte Bronte

"I hold to another creed, which no one ever taught me, and which I seldom mention, but in which I delight, and to which I cling, for it extends hope to all."

8 Jan 2009

Is that my fate?

Do they prove anything to you, these tears?

All that I had I laid outside that door
where I was told you lived, and someone took those gifts,
was it you?

Were they that worthless that no thanks was given?
That must have been the case for I heard
not one word of gratitude.

Has it ever happened that a lover courting a lover
has not offered trinkets? Surely you did
not begrudge me for that.

In the world of amorous play amongst your forest creatures
I have tried to learn some secret about love
to bring you as near as they did; for I see how happy
you made them.

The flame called the moth but the glass pane was there.
How many have died not in the fire but in the cold,
crazed in longing.

Is that fate of any heart to not reach you?

No, no, that is not the fate of any soul.

-St. John of the Cross