Know Yourself

KNOW YOURSELF 

Know yourself they say 

and don’t be led astray

but how can I know who I am 

when I’m different every day?

Some days I’m the smart one 

with the answers people need 

and some days I’m the strong one 

standing up to take the lead.

On other days I’m sure 

that if the wind blew me too hard 

I would shatter like a glass

into a million tiny shards.

And on those days I cower 

and I hide out from the world

waiting on my inner child

to blossom and unfurl.

And each day I’m surprised 

by the newness that I see

the things I’m finding out

the complexity of me.

So how to know yourself 

when you’re all things rolled in one? 

you simply must decide

to love whatever you become.

Donna Ashworth

From ‘I Wish I Knew

After Awhile

 

After a while you learn the subtle difference
between holding a hand and chaining a soul,
and you learn that love doesn’t mean leaning
and company doesn’t mean security.

And you begin to learn that kisses aren’t contracts
and presents aren’t promises
and you begin to accept your defeats
with your head up and your eyes open,
with the grace of a woman, not the grief of a child.

And you learn to build all your roads on today,
Because tomorrow’s ground is too uncertain for plans
and futures have a way of falling down in mid-flight.

After a while you learn that even sunshine
Burns if you get too much.
So you plant your own garden and decorate your own soul,
Instead of waiting for someone to bring you flower.

And you learn that you really can endure…
that you really are strong
and you really do have worth,
and you learn and learn…
With every goodbye you learn.

-Veronica Shoffstall

God, Thou Art Love

 

GOD THOU ART LOVE

If I forget,
Yet God remembers! If these hands of mine
Cease from their clinging, yet the hands divine
Hold me so firmly that I cannot fall;
And if sometimes I am too tired to call
For Him to help me, then He reads the prayer
Unspoken in my heart, and lifts my care.

I dare not fear, since certainly I know
That I am in God’s keeping, shielded so
From all that else would harm, and in the hour
Of stern temptation strengthened by His power;
I tread no path in life to Him unknown;
I lift no burden, bear no pain, alone:
My soul a calm, sure hiding-place has found:
The everlasting arms my life surround.

God, Thou art love! I build my faith on that.
I know Thee who has kept my path, and made
Light for me in the darkness, tempering sorrow
So that it reached me like a solemn joy;
It were too strange that I should doubt Thy love.
by Robert Browning

If I Could Your Heaven Sent Angel Be

Many years ago, I received a poem in the mail. It had no return address and no signature. The year was 1974. I received it when I was 16 years old, living in New York city, during a very dark time in my life right after a time my good friend Mike was killed in a car crash. (Mike has his very own label right here in my blog.) It was such a beautiful poem filled with love and comfort. I kept it folded in my wallet for many years never knowing who sent it to me. As a matter of fact, I still have it. 

So many years later, through the gift of the internet ,I was in touch with an old friend from back in New York. He admitted it was he who had written the poem to me all those years ago.  I was glad to have had the poem mystery solved. But more importantly, I finally had the chance to thank him and told him how much his words had helped me through some very sad days and how often I read that poem at the time. 

It's funny. I didn't know who wrote it and he didn't know how much it meant to me. Sometimes in life you just don't know. Sometimes in life things happen and you really don't need to know the who or the why.  Something like angels I guess.  You just know that someone, somewhere is out there. And sometimes there is one who cared enough to send a kind word and those words help to either get you through another day or give in to pain and grief that wanted to swallow you whole. 

That very day, some 45 years later, he wrote me another. Thanks Bart. You're an angel.

If I Could Your Heaven Sent Angel Be 

Now that we are so many years older
I wonder could I be a wee bit bolder
And say to you if I had angel’s wings
I would not be one who heavenly sings.

As in poems of youth I tried to comfort thee
When sad darkness was all that you could see
When one love was lost - there at your side,
There was a love - that I chose to hide.

Now no songs of happiness and of loves lost
Or of how to be brave and bear the costs
While hiding tears and subduing fears
And keeping up smiles all these years. 

Instead I would wing my through chill night
To you as you sleep, drawn for just the sight
Of the beauty you held then, and still now hold;
I’ve cried for years never to have been so bold.

And should you awaken as I come near
I would shudder at discovery’s fear
Would it be ever too much to bear
So much that I’d swiftly flee from there?

Or would I stay a moment longer
Would my resolve grow any stronger
Would your sweet smile me embolden
Or to shyness would I stay beholden.

I beg my inner self to me would show
by some magic that I would stay - not go 

That I would not fly alone into the night 

Trembling afeard of such a beauteous sight.

Tonight, should fallen angel promise me
That this dream could become reality
For one night of this, my soul I’d sell
And brave eternity in downtrodden hell.


Yet, if I could your heaven sent angel be,
There would be joy and no mystery.
For I would forever be there at your side
And my love for you I could never hide.

Yet a weak man am I, without angel’s wings
And dreams of mine - are but misty things.
Yet through night’s mist I now see you smile
And for that I’ve winged o’er many a mile.



Love,
Bart (yes this one I wrote, just tonight)

Beneath the Sweater and the Skin

Silver


"How many years of beauty do I have left? she asks me.

How many more do you want?

Here. Here is 34. Here is 50.

When you are 80 years old and your beauty rises in ways
your cells cannot even imagine now,
and your wild bones grow luminous and ripe,
having carried the weight of a passionate life.

When your hair is aflame with winter
and you have decades of learning and leaving and loving
sewn into the corners of your eyes
and your children come home
to find their own history in your face.

When you know what it feels like to fail ferociously
and have gained the capacity
to rise and rise and rise again.

When you can make your tea
on a quiet and ridiculously lonely afternoon
and still have a song in your heart
Queen owl wings beating
beneath the cotton of your sweater.

Because your beauty began there
beneath the sweater and the skin,
remember?

This is when I will take you
into my arms and coo
YOU BRAVE AND GLORIOUS THING
you’ve come so far.

I see you.
Your beauty is breathtaking."

~ Jeannette Encinias

At The Foot of the Cross

At the Foot of the Cross
Fearing the battle was over
And I’d already lost the war,
I was tired of trying and failing.
I just couldn’t fight anymore.
So, dragging my battle-scarred body,
I crawled to the foot of the cross.
And I sobbed. ‘Oh please, Father forgive me.
But I tried…I tried.. and still lost.’
Then the air grew silent around me.
I heard his voice just as clear as the dawn:
‘Oh, My child, though you are tired and weary,
You can’t stop, you have to go on.’
At the foot of the Cross , where I met Him,
At the foot of the Cross, where He died,
I felt love, as I knelt in His presence .
I felt hope, as I looked in His eyes.

Then He gathered me lovingly to Him,
As around us God’s light clearly shone.
And together we walked though my lifetime
To heal every wound I had known.
I found bits of my dreams, long forgotten ,
And pieces of my life on the floor.
But I watched as He tenderly blessed them,
And my life was worth living once more.
I knew then why I had been losing.
I knew why I had not grown.
At the foot of the Cross came the answer:
I’d been fighting the battle alone.

At the foot of the Cross, where I met Him,
At the foot of the Cross, where He died,
Then I knew I could face any challenge
Together–just my Lord and I.
by Marcia Krugh Leaser

Rod McKuen - Where Are We Now

1Corinthians 13 "The Love Chapter for Mothers"

The Love Chapter For Mothers

If I talk to my children about what is right and what is wrong, but have not love, 

I am like a ringing doorbell or pots banging in the kitchen.

And though I know what stages my children will go through and understand their growing pains, and can answer all their questions about life and believe myself to be a devoted mother,

 but have not love, I am nothing.

If I give up the fulfillment of a career to make my children’s lives better and stay up all night sewing costumes or baking cookies on short notice, but grumble about lack of sleep, 

I have not love and accomplish nothing.

A loving mother is patient with her children’s immaturity and kind even when they are not; a loving mother is not jealous of their youth, nor does she hold it over their heads whenever she has sacrificed for them.

A loving mother believes in her children; she hopes in each one’s individual ability to stand out as a light in a dark world; she endures every heartache and backache to accomplish that.

A loving mother never really dies.

 As for home-baked bread, it will be consumed and forgotten; as for spotless floors, they will soon gather dust and heel marks.

 As for children, right now toys, friends, and food are all-important to them. But when they grow up, it will be their mother’s love that they will remember and pass on to others.

 In that way, she will live on.

So care, training, and a loving mother reside in a home,

 these three; 

but the greatest of these is a loving mother.

-by Dianne Lorang

There has to be a song

There has to be a song-

       There are too many dark nights,
       too many troublesome days,
       too many wearisome miles, 

There has to be a song- 

        to make our burdens bearable,
        to make our hopes believable,
        to transform our successes into praise,
        to release the chains of past defeats.

Somewhere- down deep in a forgotten corner of each man’s heart-

There has to be a song-

Like a cool, clear drink of water,
Like the gentle warmth of sunshine
Like the tender love of a child.
                              - There has to be a song.

- Robert Benson

Poem For A Happy Marriage

I do my thing, and you do your thing.
I am not in the world to live up to your expectations
and you are not in this world to live up to mine.
You are you.
And I am I.
and if by chance we find each other..
it's beautiful.

Listen To The Warm -Rod McKuen

Rod McKuen is another favorite of mine. His books, Listen To The Warm and Seasons In The Sun (yes, he wrote the song that was a big hit in the 70's) are two of my favorites. Breathtaking and heartbreaking. Just the way I like it.

I've drawn your face
on tablecloths across the country.
Tracing your smile
with my index finger,
making your hair just so.
Till now you are more
what I want you to be
than what you are.

I can paint yours eyes and say
this is where I lived
for twenty minutes and more.

I order grapefruit
and pay for ruined napkins.
And between the morning and the eveningI draw your face a little fainter every day.
++++++++

“I've been going a long time now

along the way I've learned some things.

You have to make the good times yourself.

Take the little times and make them into big times

and save the times that are all right

for the ones that aren't so good.”

―  Rod McKuen, Listen To The Warm

+++++++

“It's nice sometimes

to open up the heart a little

and let some hurt come in.

It proves you're still alive.”

―  Rod McKuen, Listen To The Warm

+++++++

How can you say something new about being alone?

Tell someone you're a loner 

and right away they think you're lonely.

It's not the same thing you know.

It's not wanting to put all your marbles in one pocket.

It;s caring enough to not care too much.

Mostly it's letting yourself come first for awhile.

                                                                 +++++++++++++

Eighteen

I stood watching
as you crossed the street
               for the last time.
Trying hard to memorize you.
Knowing it would be important.
The way you walked,
the way you looked back over you shoulder at me.

Years later 

I would hear the singing of the wind

and the day's singing would come back.

That time of going would return to me

every sun-gray day.

April or August it would be the same

       for years to come.

Man has not made the kind of bromide

that would let me sleep without your memory

or written erotically enough

to erase the excitement of just your hands.

These long years later it is worse

for I remember what it was

as well as what it might have been.

+++++++

“This is the way it was while I was waiting for your eyes to find me.”

―  Rod McKuen, Listen To The Warm

++++++

“Be gentle with me, new love.

Treat me tenderly.

I need the gentle touch,

the soft voice,

the candlelight after nine.

There's been so many who didn't understand

so give me all the love I see in your timid eyes

but give it gently.

Please.”

―  Rod McKuen, Listen To The Warm

+++++++

We come into the world alone,

we go away the same.

we're meant to spend 

the interlude

between in closeness

or so we tell ourselves,

But it's a long way from morning to the evening.

 -Rod McKuen, Listen To The Warm

+++++++

There is no wrong side or right side.
No misery in not being loved
only in not loving.
I learned these truths myself
I tell them to you now
as you go sailing through the sun
on your way towards life.
+++++++

I don't have to touch you
to be touching you
Nor feel your face to feel your face. 
Yet, sometimes touching you 
I feel you not at all.
There seems to be 
so much of you at times
enough to fill
and spill across the room.
Other times
I stretch in your direction
and draw back to me
great armfuls of air.
++++++++

In loving you

I've held back no reserve

and so I've nothing left

to give tomorrow's lover

when you go.

+++++

And then there is my favorite:

If You Go Away (Ne me quitte pas-Please Don't Go)

If you go away on this summer day,

Then you might as well take the sun away;

All the birds that flew in the summer sky,

When our love was new and our hearts were high

When the day was young and the night was long,

and the moon stood still for the night birds song.

If you go away, Ne me quitte pas

But if you stay, I'll make you a day

Like no day has been, or will be again;

We'll sail the sun, we'll ride on the rain,

We'll talk to the trees and worship the wind.

Then if you go, I'll understand,

Leave me just enough love to fill up my hand,
++++++++

  

My Lost Youth- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

My Lost Youth -  Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

There are things of which I may not speak;
There are dreams that cannot die;
There are thoughts that make the strong heart weak,
And bring a pallor into the cheek,
And a mist before the eye.
And the words of that fatal song
Come over me like a chill:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

Strange to me now are the forms I meet
When I visit the dear old town;
But the native air is pure and sweet,
And the trees that o'ershadow each well-known street,
As they balance up and down,
Are singing the beautiful song,
Are sighing and whispering still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will, 

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

And Deering's Woods are fresh and fair,
And with joy that is almost pain
My heart goes back to wander there,
And among the dreams of the days that were,
I find my lost youth again.
And the strange and beautiful song,
The groves are repeating it still:
"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

Special Woman-For Grandma Sarah

An original song written for my Grandma Sarah. 1974

SPECIAL WOMAN

By Joanne H. 1974

Time goes by and I wonder

      how you managed to be here with me.

Miles and trials that you conquered with pride,

     tears and fears that you kept deep inside.

Grandmother, wise and true,

     someday I hope to be just like you.

Special woman, teach me your ways,

     the lessons you’ve learned through your long struggling days.

Years go by and I wonder

      how you climbed to reach your goals.

Times were hard but you stuck to your dreams,

      whenever they tore, you sewed back the seams?

Grandmother wise and strong,

      I learned of life from how you got along.

Special woman, life cant be done

      Till you’ve waited with our Lord for forever to come.

Life goes by and now you wonder

       how a young mind can truly see

back through years of an ageless lifetime

       and from it learn how to conquer and climb.

Grandmother wisest of minds,

      of values, virtue, love and good times.

Special woman, wonder no more it’s true…..

      All this I have learned and found in you.

Why Do I Love You?

WHY DO I LOVE YOU? 

by Roy Croft

I love you… Not only for what you are,

But for what I am when I am with you.

I love you… Not only for what you have made of yourself,

But for what you are making of me.

I love you… For ignoring the possibilities of the fool in me

And for laying firm hold of the possibilities for good.

Why do I love you?

I love you… For closing your eyes to the discords

And for adding to the music in me by worshipful listening.

I love you…

Because you are helping me to make of the lumber of my life

Not a tavern, but a temple;

And out of the words of my every day, not a reproach, but a song.

I love you…

Because you have done more than any creed to make me happy.

You have done it, without a word, without a touch, without a sign.

You have done it just by being yourself.

After all, perhaps that is what love means.

My Son

I Believe

• A simple song of simple faith that I have loved since I was a little girl.
  
  I believe for every drop of rain that falls, a flower grows.
  I believe that somewhere in the darkest night, a candle glows.
  I believe for everyone who goes astray, someone will come to show the way.
  I believe, I believe.
  I believe above the storm the smallest pray'r will still be heard.
  I believe that someone in the great somewhere hears every word.
  Every time I hear a newborn baby cry, or touch a leaf or see the sky,
  Then I know why I believe!
  
  
  Writer(s): Yvan Eric Cassar, Shirl Jimmy, Al Stillman, Jule Styne, Ervin Drake, Sammy Cahn, Eric Levisalles, Irvin Graham
  Copyright: Sands Music Corp., Larry Spier Music LLC, Universal Music Publishing
  
  

The Road Not Taken

I have always loved this poem. 

The Road Not Taken - Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

The One Flaw In Women

I personally find these traits to be a blessing of humility not a flaw. - J

 Women have strengths that amaze men…..

They bear hardships and they carry burdens,

but they hold happiness, love and joy.

They smile when they want to scream.

They sing when they want to cry.

They cry when they are happy

and laugh when they are nervous.

They fight for what they believe in.

They stand up to injustice.

They don’t take “no” for an answer

when they believe there is a better solution.

They go without so their family can have.

They go to the doctor with a frightened friend.

They love unconditionally.

They cry when their children excel

and cheer when their friends get awards.

They are happy when they hear about

a birth or a wedding.

Their hearts break when a friend dies.

They grieve at the loss of a family member,

yet they are strong when they

think there is no strength left.

They know that a hug and a kiss

can heal a broken heart.

Women come in all shapes, sizes and colors.

They’ll drive, fly, walk, run or e-mail you

to show how much they care about you.

The heart of a woman is what

makes the world keep turning.

They bring joy, hope and love.

They have compassion and ideas.

They give moral support to their

family and friends.

Women have vital things to say

and everything to give.

HOWEVER, IF THERE IS ONE FLAW IN WOMEN,

IT IS THAT THEY FORGET THEIR WORTH. 

-author unknown

Promise Yourself

To be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind.

To talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet.

To make all your friends feel that there is something in them

To look at the sunny side of everything and make your optimism come true.

To think only the best, to work only for the best, and to expect only the best.

To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.

To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.

To wear a cheerful countenance at all times and give every living creature you meet a smile.

To give so much time to the improvement of yourself that you have no time to criticize others.

To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.

To think well of yourself and to proclaim this fact to the world, not in loud words but great deeds.

To live in faith that the whole world is on your side so long as you are true to the best that is in you.”

― Christian D. Larson, Your Forces and How to Use Them

Faults - Sara Teasdale

Faults

They came to tell your faults to me,

They named them over one by one;

I laughed aloud when they were done,

I knew them all so well before,--

Oh, they were blind, too blind to see

Your faults had made me love you more.”

                          ― Sara Teasdale, Love Songs