In The Placid Summer Midnight

I love this poem, I am hesitant to share the poetry I love sometimes just because I feel like people do not appreciate it like I do, and I don't want anyone or anything to take away from it. How very dramatic of me but it's true. I feel like poems have the power to move the spirit if a person is open, but I am a writer so of course I think that. I do however know that Lauren will enjoy it so I will post it for her. :)

In the placid summer midnight,




Under the drowsy sky,



I seem to hear in the stillness



The moths go glimmering by.









One by one from the windows



The lights have all been sped.



Never a blind looks conscious -



The street is asleep in bed!









But I come where a living casement



Laughs luminous and wide;



I hear the song of a piano



Break in a sparkling tide;









And I feel, in the waltz that frolics



And warbles swift and clear,



A sudden sense of shelter



And friendliness and cheer . . .









A sense of tinkling glasses,



Of love and laughter and light -



The piano stops, and the window



Stares blank out into the night.









The blind goes out, and I wander



To the old, unfriendly sea,



The lonelier for the memory



That walks like a ghost with me.
 
By William Ernest Henley

Miss Me But Let Me Go

  "Those we love don't go away, they walk beside us every day, unseen, unheard, but always near, still loved, still missed and very dear." Papa Bob died October 25, 2010. It was like a jolt to the heart, I never saw it coming. I guess because I always saw Papa Bob as a strong and brave man that I never thought he could die, I mean I knew it would happen eventually but not this year, not this month. The hardest part about losing him was that I didn’t get to say goodbye. The last time I saw him was father’s day where he pushed me to sit in his lap with him and watch football, but I only stayed there on the couch with him for a few minutes and then I was off to do something else. Had I known that was the last time I would see him, I would have urged him to tell me more stories of when he was young and serving in the war, because I loved his stories. I would have told him I loved him and hugged him tight before he drove away. I guess we all have our “If I had only known” moments. In a flash though he was gone, and since the moment I found out he had passed, guilt and sadness tore at my heart. So I pleaded with God, “Just one chance Lord, let me say goodbye, even if it’s only a dream”.  The days passed though, and even after the funeral when the 21 gun salute went off and the music played, and the breeze blew through the autumn trees I pictured him standing there with us, waiting for us to set him free. And even as I laid the single rose on his casket and blew him a kiss, it still didn’t feel like goodbye. There was still this pain in my heart, until Saturday night as I was laying in bed, I asked God again to let me say goodbye and as I drifted between sleep and conciseness I had a dream. It was just like the day of his funeral, the sun was shining and the slight breeze sent chills up my spine and I was standing over a grave covered in the fallen leaves. I begin to sweep the leaves away and something told me “Robbie it’s time to go” the voice was almost urgent. So I backed away and looked up and in the distance on a hill was the silhouette of a man. I could tell he was in uniform because I could see the outline of his hat. I knew instantly that it was Papa Bob, and in a single gesture he lifted his hand  and waved and it seemed like minutes he stood there waving, and I knew this was goodbye. Then I woke up. God had given me my goodbye and some may think it was just a dream but I know it was him and I know he knows how hurt I was that I didn’t say goodbye. I also I know that he is up in heaven, young and beautiful again and he will be a part of the greeting party that awaits me when I  go to meet my savior. My heart is at peace.

Paradox By J.B. Rittenhouse

This is just a poem I really like. It's too deep for a facebook status..lol


I WENT out to the woods to-day


To hide away from you,

From you a thousand miles away—

But you came, too.



And yet the old dull thought would stay,

And all my heart benumb—

If you were but a mile away

You would not come.

Nothing

I have come to the realization that my life is worth nothing, and has no purpose, no hope. That is unless I am doing something, something not for myself but for someone else. If I am not loving someone, helping them, making a difference then I AM NOTHING. My life has no value to me if I am not giving everything I am to something greater than myself. I have only one life to live and it will not be in vain! Everyday things don't satisfy me anymore. I can no longer sit here and be quiet and my heart is screaming out for something more. My life is worthless in my own hands. So I give it to God, and like the potter he is, he is forming this clay into something he sees fit. I won't be still much longer because the fire inside of me is growing, and the yearnings of my heart are beating violently in my chest and I can feel change coming. Something big, bigger than myself. My worthless, pointless life is no longer my own but God's. And now everything is becoming clearer, and I am growing anxious because nothing is correct anymore, nothing around me seems right. I am crying out to God "Tell me what to do, who I can serve and I will do it! Show me!". That is my hearts plea because I was nothing, but now life is becoming something.

Echo

Vincent Van Gogh once said “I am not an adventurer by choice but by fate”. It is the same with me. My imagination has danced with thoughts of heroic adventures since I was a child, but it was only in my mind, and I walked through life longing for the adventures I only read about, and it gnawed at my heart knowing I would never go on a adventure quite like the ones I watched on TV or read in books. Such a cruel reality for a kid. So I wandered through life, doing what everyone else was doing, believing what everyone else believed but inside my heart there was an echo, and the echo ached. It ached for something more, something bigger in life. I tried to ignore it, but something always awakened it. Sometimes it was something I saw with my eyes, like a painted sunset, or it was something I heard like the uncontainable laughter of a child who was living in poverty on the streets of Tanzania. Whatever it was all I know is that I couldn’t shake it, the feeling that tells you “There is something more…you have a destiny”. Then one day it all came to me. We live in a world where good and evil are constantly at war. Satan is constantly destroying people, and their hearts and we brush it off and say “Oh, that’s just life”. It isn’t life, there is actually someone working behind the scenes and just because we can’t see him does not mean he is not there, and just like any tale of heroism we are called to be warriors. To fight the good fight!!! (1 Tim 6:12) To protect others, the orphans, the poor, the broken. Were called to love others and to give our lives for what we believe is true, and right even if it means everyone is against you. Were all in this battle, and just because we are not carrying swords and wearing armor doesn’t mean that it isn’t real. Satan is winning when he convinces you that this life is all there is, that this mundane life boring life is it. Each and everyone has a Destiny that is greater than anything we can imagine but like any good tale of adventure, one has to step up and embrace it, and that takes courage. So be courageous. Someone somewhere maybe waiting for you to step up. What happens if you never do?

A Little Deeper

"I remember a place... a town... a house like a lot of houses... a yard like a lot of other yards... on a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is, after all these years, I sill look back... with wonder" -The Wonder Years

 I think about my childhood a lot. I think about that little street and that house and all the memories there. I think about my brother mostly. And when I go back in my mind, it's me and him building forts and breaking things in our back yard and I can still see the excitement in his eyes when whenever we would do something. I looked up to him as a child, he was my partner in crime. Now I barely know him. He is older and the adventure and excitement that once filled his eyes as a small boy no longer resides there. Instead there is something else in his eyes. A sadness, and a hurt that he received after a life filled with betrayal after betrayal, hurt after hurt. That is all I see now and I guess it's so easy to love him with my whole heart no matter what he says or does because he is forever frozen in my mind as that 10 year old boy I followed around like a puppy for most of my childhood. Now all I think about anymore is had I only been a little braver, then maybe I could have saved him. I know one thing, and is that there will never be a day I will look back and not wonder.

Opened Cage

Butterflies danced in old dusty places

New feelings filled empty spaces.

Awake and alive deep inside

Broke the ropes that had me tied.

All to fast and all too soon

Dancing around a setting moon
Hope filled my soul at last
Gave me the rush I knew wouldn't last.
All is not gone and I am not lost
I would dance again at the same cost
The musics still playing and my heart still beats
You left with the world alive at my feet.

The Art Of The Heart

    Pablo Picasso once said “Are we to paint what's on the face, what's inside the face, or what's behind it?”. Most people think that Picasso’s art was only abstract, and child like. Many people criticize his work and think “Man I can paint better than this guy”. Little do most people know that Picasso started painting at a young age, and could depict any person or thing perfectly on a canvas. He could make paintings look so life like, and fill them with such emotion and color. He got bored though, of meeting everyone’s expectations, of painting “In the lines” and there for started painting abstract art called “Cubism”. Picasso would paint the subject from many different perspectives. He wanted to shy away from peoples traditional understanding of perspective. I never learned to appreciate Picasso’s art until I knew more about Picasso. He was an amazing painter who went against the grain and stopped painting the way people expected him too, despite the criticism that his art still receives to this day. Now when I look at Picasso’s work I don’t see “Child like paintings” but I see ART. I see individualism and courage, and boldness. Then it came to me, what if I stopped looking at people as just people, but more as art. After all we are all the art work of God. What if instead of only observing the subject, we look a little deeper into this piece of art. Look at scars not as flaws but as stories, for we all have scars, some of us just wear ours on the inside. What if when we looked at someone, we saw their life, their journey, there heart and in that we see their features. Picasso taught me something…to really appreciate someone, to really see their beauty, I have to look a little deeper, because behind every face is a story, and sometimes it’s a beautiful one.

 "My mother said to me, 'If you are a soldier, you will become a general. If you are a monk, you will become the Pope.' Instead, I was a painter, and became Picasso" -Pablo Picasso

Always On My Mind....

During a small reign of boredom, I decided to compile some of my favorite quotes....enjoy.

"I will have poetry in my life. And adventure. And love. Love above all. No... not the artful postures of love, not playful and poetical games of love for the amusement of an evening, but love that... over-throws life. Unbiddable, ungovernable - like a riot in the heart, and nothing to be done, come ruin or rapture. Love - like there has never been in a play" - Viola (Shakespear In Love)

"There's another kind of love. One that gives you the courage to be better than you are, not less than you are. One that makes you feel that anything is possible. I want you to know that you could have that. I want you to hold out for it." - Nights in Rodanthe

 "The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds" - Noah

“Don't be dismayed at goodbyes, a farewell is necessary before you can meet again and meeting again, after moments or lifetimes, is certain for those who are friends.” -Richard Bach

"You and I will meet again. When we're least expecting it...One day in some far off place, I will recognize your face. I won't say goodbye my friend. For you and I will meet again" Tom Petty

"If a June night could talk, it would probably boast it invented romance." -Bern Williams

"In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer." -Albert Camus

I Wish

I wish I could save you, and I know only God can. But know that I will never give up on you. I'll always fight for you brother.

The Ink Of Dreams

Her name was Jenny. She was a ordinary girl for the most part. She never stood out in the crowd and most days she was overlooked. She never wanted to stand out though. She preferred the solitary life, where she attended school unnoticed. Then returned home where she found solace in writing about the life she wish she had. Something magical happened when she wrote though. She didn’t just write a story but became the story. She could write herself into any place and time. She had been able to do it ever since she was able to pick up a pen. Jenny’s parents had skipped out on her when she was only 6, right after little brother Michael had gone missing. They never found him, and most everyone believed that they never would. So she lived with her aunt in a tiny house on the lower part of New Orleans and most days her aunt never noticed her comings or goings. The great thing about it though is while she was away in her story, time passed slowly in reality. So she was able to go wherever she wanted whenever she wanted, and not worry too much about missing anything.

Today though was a dreary day, a hurricane was on the move and most everyone was leaving town but Jenny wasn’t worried. The levy’s would hold back the water just like they always did. So she turned the lights off, sat down at her desk and lit a candle. She listened to the wind beat against the windows and watched the shadow of the rain trickle down the wall. She wasn’t sure where she was going today, but she felt like going somewhere beautiful, and magical. Some place sunny where she could rest her mind. So she began to write, and as she wrote her pen became her thoughts. She closed her eyes and when she opened them she was in the middle of a field of daisies. The light of the sun fell perfectly on her face. She closed her eyes taking it all in. Smiling as the daisies came up off their stems and danced around her, singing her favorite song as they swayed. She danced with them, spinning in circles in her yellow sun dress before falling to the ground laughing along with the flowers. She leaned back and  looked up into the sky, as the clouds began to form into shapes. The billowing white clouds came together forming a herd of horses, and the crash of thunder rang in her ears as they raced across the sky. Then silently she closed her eyes and within minutes drifted off to sleep.

 When she woke up the everything was just as she had left it. Perfect. She yawned and stretched out looking around wondering what she could think up next. Then suddenly something happened she didn’t understand. Something she didn’t write.

There, 20 yards ahead of her was a large White Tiger. She stood there, frozen. Unsure of what to do. Never had something come into her writing that she had not thought up. As much as she wanted to be afraid, she couldn’t. She only felt peace and then suddenly and overwhelming sense of curiousity. She began to walk towards the Tiger as if in a trance. The sun reflected brightly against its white fur and she stopped shielding her eyes. Then out from behind the Tiger stepped a small boy, she couldn’t’ make out his face against the light of the Tiger, but as the boy stepped out in front of the lion she gasped. “Hello Jenny” the boy voice was soft and sweet like a melody. Jenny fell to her knees, as he walked toward her. Tears instantly pouring down her face then disappearing before they hit the ground. She reached up her hand and cupped the side of his face “How are you here Michael?” she whispered. She had tried to write Michael into her stories many times but could never remember exactly how he looked. His face gleamed with beauty, everything about him was more beautiful then she remembered. Even his once brown eyes were dancing in a mixture of green and blue. “We have come to take you home Jenny” he replied grabbing hand and pulling her to her feet. “We?” she asked , searching her brain for any excuse to why this might me happening. He pulled her towards the white tiger who stood exactly in the same spot as before. “Yes, Rapha and I have come to take you home” he exclaimed. Jenny came to a stop only a few feet from the Tiger. It’s eyes stared into her. They were soft eyes though, and when he looked at her she couldn’t help but feel complete, and as if the Tiger were looking at her in adoration. “Come now Jenny” the tigers voice sent a shudder through her body and it filled the air around her like a song. It was neither the voice of a woman or a man but something she had never heard or explain. Something she could of never thought to write. “I am home, I mean..I was, and then I came here…” but before Jenny could finish everything disappeared around her and all she was standing outside her house in New Orleans. The rain pelted against her house and the wind blew around her but she didn’t move or get wet. That’s when she saw it, a huge wave of water coming towards her and her house. She tried to run but couldn’t and watched in horror as the rushing water flew past her and through her house, and when the water settled her house was gone, the water had taken it without hesitation.

Before she could blink she was back in the field. She stood there in silence. “The levy’s broke, while I was away...they said that wouldn't happen...” she whispered staring at ground. Then she felt the hand of her 4 year old brother fill her own, and he looked up and whispered “Let’s go home.” The sadness of what she had just seen vanished the instant he touched her. She turned grabbing her little brother and hugged him. Crying as she did. She was so overwhelmed with joy, and happiness and love that she completly forgot about everything back home. Then they both walked hand and hand into eternity with Rapha.

Imagine Me

Iwill it to wash over me
just like the waves at sea
entangling my beauty
and everything that be
Peace come like the ocean
Grace like an evening breeze
and hope like a hunger.
Let life thirst for me
Fill me up and let me drowned
in a crystal waterfall
 and let the pounding of my heart be the only sound.
Pass through my soul with valiance
lift me up into the sky.
We'll dance around the thunder
Victory our cry.
If ever you should leave me
I would merely fade to dust.
Tears would be my melody
and earthly things my lust.