when rain speaks she has no shallow dexterity she holds the bosom of skies in peaceful mothering’s broken drops of purpose, going back before the days of moses,
she smells familiar, like the beginning, a leaping exodus, barring wide -stirrings
billows, openings and moaning’s to songs of mercy ditty-breaks, of breathing rain, heaving -heavy her chorus, of holy wonder, dimensions and multitudes will look upon her… she is poet, and prophet, falling with the sunrise, and rising with the night sky.
And just like that I’d missed another day arriving far away from my knowing. I was so busy, doing nothing, so busy running into myself, turning around in dog tails, wagging in place. Panting, with my ear touching the cold floor, that held me down for a little while. Tile, black chalked lines, this is the memorial for leisure. Nowadays, when the sun is out and I’m shut in. When the wind desires to pick me up and take me for a spin. I won’t say no,
Dear kindness, God has granted us days like this. Where it snows and then the big bright sun comes out of hiding. To take personal inventory. Letting out the bitter – lumps of salt blows in.
Sometimes I don’t always know how to stay afloat. And that’s okay. In a smile or tear, showing compassion with friends, listening hears -reload,
it takes patience, for kindness, it takes patience for the soul,
Dear kindness, I feel there’s so much to say. It seems like the world has swallowed a nightmare pill. Somewhere between earth and mars -we are here. Are we ready to wake up?
I needed to run and write, like my life depends upon it. Only because I believe my life has wrapped itself around my faith.
These are the moments, we use our darkness to pursue light. Running to catch fire. Gently light the wings of the butterfly, running to carry tear drops in teacups. Running…
Moments of the darkness,
“We wear the mask” it shades our fears but not our eyes
unforgotten missions, weeping warriors,
our sighs’ our pleas, our hearts open, God, let it be…
“Nevertheless, not my will, but thine”
“surrendered battles, veils and temples, vinegar, and thorns
Dear Kindness, starting a garden without a green thumb is overwhelming. I felt like nothing would grow. After 4 weeks, I dropped the entire box of seedlings. I almost cried. Okay I did. I sat there in dirt for a moment.
Dirt seemed to fly every which way. I swept my little pods and placed them in the box.
Saddened by my butter-fingers. No one to blame but me. I’m always dropping something or knocking something over. I started praying, humming a little ditty in my spirit.
Praying over my house, over my plants, over my neighbors, over this pandemic and everything in between.
Praying and cleaning as usually. I went to bed and got up the next morning to my surprise things are growing.
Now, don’t ask me, what’s what? At this point. I’m overjoyed!
I just have to keep going and let nature run its course.
Plants are resilient little things, and so are we.
If ever there was such such a thing as Virtual Prayers -Hugs. This is the place to be! https://praypower4today.wordpress.com/ These ladies have become my prayer friends across the internet: There’s Sue giving out her wisdom, Auntie Ruth, delivering virtual booster shots of goodness, might I add, every now and then “a virtual punch in the arm.” Knocking out those bad vibes.
Then there’s Lori, she’s my writing sister, even though we’ve never physically met. I’ve been touched by her soul. Felt the warmth of her being, seen goodness flow from page to page. I’ve been brought back to life with her words. ( go on over – you won’t be disappointed ) Tell them, the kindness sister sent ya! https://praypower4today.wordpress.com/
Thanks Aunt Ruth for the 411 connect on this one. Lori and I share a love for poetry.
I think it’s only fitting for National Poetry Month.
Hope inside the soul has way of living in perilous times. Just when I think I’ve hit my lowest point. Or the bottom breaks from underneath me. There is hope stirring. Even on my street. Where the Bodega has closed, the young boy survived the latest shooting, at the church on 21 street. Recently he came to give his life back to God.
We taste hope just as the first lizard of the morning sticks out her tongue You’d not notice. It takes, as they say, an eye. to catch the beauty of the blue-winged dragonfly Still, spring cannot be contained; it bursts into bud: daffodils nodding, blonde and careless, trees shaking down three-doors down, in a small caddis, vagrant-vacant lot dripping with hunger petals, unseasonal flurries. New grass pokes shyly from the lawn, and smells, cut, just as it did last summer. Hope has no fairy tales with rewarding endings We are not the same, shaken as only the most microscopic menaces can make us. Yet. Hopes lives in the lives of shattered things Nothing can impede the rush to Easter. The stone rolls away, light as an egg. destined for rapture, of better things What lies inside is awaiting us.
poetry by Lori Strawn, (Lori’s words are Italic, mine are bold)
Dear kindness, I keep showing up here, while the world is always overly busy. I’m finally learning,- learning to slow down, catch a glimpse of the breeze I’ve been chasing. Air so crisp and light. I exhale my many roles, of many hats, bag-lady-queen,
sip kindly my blueberry tea-percolating.
Inwardly the steps I’ve been making,
air-tight cultivating, reservoirs of faith
in times like these, our gatherings were not in vain
I came here because the the world is always changing. Sometimes I am too.
Yet and still…
I believe human kindness is a way of putting our arms around the world with compassion in raw un-edited truth that changes the way we write poetry. Kindness, I believe is a moral lifestyle. I’m just trying to do my part in making the world a better place.
I believe kindness-poetry can be felt- chirping off the page. Even now, there’s this gentle nudge that lets’ me know, I’m not alone. That’s kindness.
I believe in kind words that can grab you from the edge of defeat, place you in the center of everything and watch your spirit rise. In the words of Alice Walker, “I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don’t notice it.”
That’s kindness too.
I believe kind-poetry in this kind-way lift voices out of ghost towns, and ghettos, and prisons- and makes our human experience- transform as to what it has been into visions of hope, and growth and strengthen our mere existence from invisible, margins of living and dying but we all could use kindness as a way of loving ourselves and each other. We could all use human kindness to rebuild extraordinary lives from what has been,
I am Eva -former refugee, doctor and a writer. My parents were Holocaust survivors, I escaped communism. I wrote a novel, mixing family stories and fiction. A novel about Holocaust, communism, racism and emigration. What makes people leave, and what happens to the ones who do, and to the ones who stay. I believe these old stories are more important now than ever before.