Crossways
Originally uploaded by lapidim

The romantic evenings. The cram sessions. The art projects. That nasty bug that's going around. The playdates. The group photos. The plumbing leak. The leftover pizzas. Marathon games of hide-and-seek. The holidays. Endless worry. Ceaseless dread. The rainy-day stir-crazies. The new puppy. The tantrums. The laundry. The slow dances. The important dinners. The naps. The alarms. the frantic mornings. And beneath it all, the underlying beauty of every single day.

To Live in the Mercy of God

To live in the mercy of God. The complete

sentence too adequate, has no give.

Awe, not comfort. Stone, elbows of

stony wood beneath lenient

moss bed.

And awe suddenly

passing beyond itself. Becomes

a form of comfort.

Becomes the steady

air you glide on, arms

stretched like the wings of flying foxes.

To hear the multiple silence

of trees, the rainy

forest depths of their listening.

To float, upheld,

as salt water

would hold you,

once you dared.

Denise Levertov

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

Albert Camus

The past is beautiful
Like the darkness between the fireflies

Mason Jennings

affection, hans eder

"Christmas waves a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is softer and more beautiful."

Norman Vincent Peale

"My idea is that there is music in the air, music all around us; the world is full of it, and you simply take as much as you require."

Edward Elgar

Some keep the Sabbath going to Church --
I keep it, staying at Home --
With a Bobolink for a Chorister --
And an Orchard, for a Dome --

Some keep the Sabbath in Surplice --
I just wear my Wings --
And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church,
Our little Sexton -- sings.

God preaches, a noted Clergyman --
And the sermon is never long,
So instead of getting to Heaven, at least --
I'm going, all along.

Emily Dickinson

Victor Gabriel, An Elegant Soiree

"Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy didn’t change the world by asking people to join their Facebook crusades or to download their platforms. Activism can only be uploaded, the old-fashioned way — by young voters speaking truth to power, face to face, in big numbers, on campuses or the Washington Mall. Virtual politics is just that — virtual."

Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times

So excuse me for forgetting
But these things I do
You see I've forgotten
If they're green or they're blue
Anyway the thing is well I really mean
Yours are the sweetest eyes I've ever seen

Elton John - Your Song

Ebb & Flow

Amber skies stretch out across
mountains rich like indigo
Blackness bleeds to grey and light breaks
As dawn slowly lifts the shadows

A path once forgotten as I strayed
looking to follow those from before
Kicking up dust with their swollen shoes
Signs linger cross the earth strung cross the shore

Not as easy to look within and see with eyes
unblinded by life's rose colored lenses
To see the truth as bare as a rigid desert
Beyond the walls of brick , beyond chain linked fences

I will not view the world in black and white
as only coal dust in mouth or sweetness of new snow
I will see the reds, the golds, and the silver lining
Adjusting the tip of my soul to capture both ebb and flow

Delias Thompson

Last thing I remember, I was
Running for the door
I had to find the passage back
To the place I was before
"Relax," said Mbulawa,
We are programmed to receive.
You can checkout any time you like,
but you can never leave.