Category: faith

Holders of Stars

On By cote8050In changes, courage, dance, earth, faith, family, god, hope, Joy, light, love, nature, peace, poetry, spirit, Woman1 Comment

I have joined my sisters and retreated.

Back and back to the very beginning,

Not just my beginning but yours, ours.

Back to when the sacredness of women was honored.

A time when it was known and valued that women were

The givers of life and holders of stars.

Society has changed over the years, but in our hearts there remains

An understanding of the continuity of our original place and purpose.

We know that we are not in or of this world

But exist in our eternal beingness.

We are awake and are coming back to claim our rightful place.

The past is remembered in our collective consciousness and it is with renewed Courage and strength that we again dance in the forest,

And the forest dances in us.

Once more the mountains and ocean belong to us,

And we to them.

Our renewed story is a recognition of our eternal story.

It is the story of our connection to the divine,

Not one limited to any certain place or time but a story for all eternity.

The same eternity that resides in a milkweed bloom, a bird’s egg,

A baby’s laugh, and our hearts.

And although our voices remain soft and gentle, we will no longer be silenced.

We are not done with this world and

The writing of our collective story will never be finished

As it has no beginning or end.

Our time is now and together we will step out of time one by one and

Rejoin our story where we were forced out of it years ago.

We are still the givers of life and

The holders of stars.

Sacred women once more,

As one voice and mind.

Together again and always.

Both

On By cote8050In changes, courage, darkness, earth, faith, hope, Joy, light, love, love poetry, poetry, Self -discovery2 Comments
Why does dark seem heavy while light is, well, light?
Is one easier to carry than the other?
Dark seems to have weight,
Light doesn’t.
Dark holds you back but
Light lights your way.
There is a dark night of the soul
But joy in the morning light.
Night’s darkness surrounds my little cottage
Making its windows shine from within.
Life’s darkness surrounds my soul making my heart shine from within.
I cannot have one without the other.
I am thankful for both.

I’ll Save Your Place

On By cote8050In Buddhism Meditation space, changes, dance, dreams, earth, faith, god, hope, Joy, light, love, love poetry, nature, peace, poetry, Self -discovery, sweetness1 Comment

The doors and windows are open wide and welcome

The wind as it blows through my house and my soul.

It brings a beingness of light and truth, peace and love, disguised as wind.

Trees sway in its beauty,

Souls sing in harmony with its truth and

The unconscious void is filled with its one love.

I know that the empty void from my past existed only in my mind.

My mind was deluded and swayed by the ways of the world but now,

I am neither of the world nor in the world as

The world is in me and you and you and you…

There is no separateness in our beings but great diversity in our humanness,

As it should be, as it was meant to be. The contrast is beautiful.

“Between the silence of the mountains and the crashing of the sea, there lives a land I once lived in and he’s waiting there for me” Moody Blues

So… will you meet me there, in the silence of the mountains, in the void of fullness, in a world of our own making

Where the wind blows its truth into our souls

And surrounds our hearts with love?

If I get there first, I’ll save your place.

Will you do the same for me?

Small Things

On By cote8050In candles, changes, courage, dreams, earth, faith, Joy, light, love, love poetry, poetry, poetry changes, Self -discovery7 Comments

“The Great arises out of small things that are honored and cared for” Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth

 

Such wisdom in so few words.

But what is the Great if not a compilation of the small.

 

Nothing is too small to be part of the One.

The Great unmainfested, is manifest in everything, including the small, especially the small.

 

It is through the ordinary manifestation of the One that it’s true

Heart and meaning is able to shine through.

 

Honor all “things” as part of the Creator

Made touchable, reachable, and real.

 

Ceremonies and traditions, ways of honoring the small things, act

As symbols and representations of caring for the One all-pervasive energy, the Creator.

 

Everywhere I look I see evidence of this truth.

When I open my eyes each morning, I acknowledge and honor the new day’s creation.

 

A new beginning with each sunrise, with each chime of the cuckoo clock,

As the new born light angles across my bed and bedroom walls.

 

My breakfast food of sweet potatoes and spinach

Lies in splendor on the golden yellow dish.

 

The lightly colored beautiful orange sweet potatoes shine

In stark contrast to the dark green warmth of the spinach.

 

They are contrasts in wholeness, beautiful small things to be honored and appreciated.

As is the tea steaming in my tea mug which shares the mug’s space and honors its useful emptiness, tea honoring mug honoring tea.

 

The shower water’s warmth and the soap’s scent of softness and peace

Honor my body and I honor their usefulness and dedication to service without selfishness.

 

And with each step and in each and every place I go throughout the day,

I try to take the time, maybe only a second or two, to notice and honor the small things.

 

After all, I am a small thing too.

 

Inner Stillness in Predawn Darkness

On By cote8050In Buddhism Meditation space, changes, darkness, earth, faith, god, hope, Joy, light, love, love poetry, nature, peace, poetry, Self -discovery, spirit6 Comments

There is inner stillness in the predawn darkness as

The forest begins to stir around me.

 

They seem to notice my presence

“Someone is among us”, they mummer.

 

As I sit in silence and wait,

The Eastern sky begins to lighten and

 

The earth responds with movement,

Air movement, a stirring, ever so slight and gentle,

 

More sensed than felt.

I continue to sit in silence and wait.

 

At last I can feel them coming closer, one by one.

Not in outer distance but in inner peace.

 

As they circle me I can feel them saying “Welcome”.

They bring such wisdom in their silence.

Such kindness without motion or audible voice

 

But a voice nonetheless, a voice that is felt with the soul

Not heard with the ears.

 

A voice that is eons old, no, older than that:

A voice that has existed since the beginning of time.

 

Since the time before manifestation.

Their voices speak to me in the sweet darkness of the woods

 

Telling me a tale of love, acceptance and kindness.

A story of life, of the essences of loss and the pain of suffering,

 

Of the agony of misunderstanding and mind induced perceptions, and

Selfish longings and needs: all of my own making.

 

But there is sympathy and empathy in these voices too, they know the pain,

They have felt the suffering, tasted the tears and watched their own hearts melt with disappointment.

 

The agony of loss is no stranger to their collective heart, so they truly understand my

State of mind today and give me comfort and love in a way only they can.

 

They know how I miss he who passed through the veil, they know him and he them. They are one together and it is his presence they allow me to feel here in this mourning morning softness.

 

The trees are my saviors; they surround me with their gentle strength and hold me in their arms

In the hardest of times, they understand without judgment, they feel my heart beat with theirs

 

As they stand together – silent sentinels of everlasting light and hope in

Noble silence and truth.

 

I am renewed by their strength, honored by their kindness and

Forever grateful for their love.

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The Soulscape of My Heart

On By cote8050In Buddhism Meditation space, earth, faith, hope, Joy, light, love poetry, nature, poetry, Self -discovery, spirit, sweetness, thanks, Zen2 Comments

Outcroppings of rock and

Lichen covered pinnacles of grandeur are

God’s favorite places.

Here he lets us see,

Lets us in on the secret of what makes him happy.

His eyes sculpted the mountains with a glance,

His hands scooped the valleys with ease giving light and dark a place to play.

His breath still powers the winds that sail and howl over the cliffs

And stir the hearts of human kind.

The mountains are God’s sacred place and

A place where I go to feel His power,

To be closer to heaven

To touch and feel His love.

He exists forever in the hard landscape of rock and

In the soft soulscape of my heart.

The One that Became the Last

On By cote8050In changes, Death, dreams, earth, faith, love, love lost, love poetry, pain, poetry, sadness5 Comments

 

The sky is happy to hold you,

While the earth and I still mourn your leaving.

They say that time heals but all these years have not healed my heart and

The emptiness of your absence remains strong within me and here in this place,

 

Although this field where I stand remains the eternal now

As it was when you and I walked here together.

The scent of its grass brings my heart and memory back to you every time and

Makes me wonder if the flowers blooming here remember our footsteps and loving among them?

I visit here often and breathe in the scent of this place and remember what it held for us, just you and me, and then I hide behind that memory’s peace where my heart is soothed, but only for just a while.

And at sunset, sadness returns again to dampen the grass and hold still my heartbeat in that remembrance.

Yet despite the passage of time and depth of my sorrow, this place appears to be unchanged

From when we walked its paths together, hand in hand as if we had all the time in the world.

But when I look deeper, I know it is unchanged on the surface only and, like me,

Still holds its breath and waits, and sighs and wonders why…

Why does the sky get to hold you so close while it and my heart long for your footsteps,

The sound of your voice, the scent of your skin, and the light of your smile?

The answer never comes and as

The sun sets and the horizon grows dark

And takes you away from me, again,

 I wonder…

Do you remember the first time?

The one that became the last?

She is Not a Quitter

On By cote8050In courage, darkness, faith, heartbreak, love, love lost, love poetry, pain, poetry, sadness, suffereing1 Comment

 

My little heart keeps asking me “why?”

I hear her tiny voice in the quiet early morning hours,

but I have no answer for her.

She has stayed up all night again.

Thinking about the past, feeling the pain and sorrow of the now.

She has fallen into a deep dark pit,

Her little voice echos off the steep, cold sides.

I keep reaching out to her but her tiny hands

Have not the strength to hold on.

So she sinks back to the bottom and

Remains in sorrow and darkness.

It is so painful to witness this.

She used to be such a happy little thing,

Always positive, always trusting.

Albeit, sometimes a bit too naive for her own good,

But it was a naiveté not based on stupidity or ignorance but

One based on a choice to trust and believe in spite of the red flags not to.

I am afraid for her, she is tired and there are

Beasts down there with her in the darkness.

They are evil, heartless beasts who lie to her,

Who tell her she is not good enough, that she is unlovable and a fool.

They sneak in while she sleeps and

Whisper doubts in her ear.

I keep trying to tell her to be strong and not listen to their lies,

But I don’t think she can hear me yet.

So, I wait on the edge of the pit

With an open mind and open hand to catch her the next time she climbs to within my reach.

I don’t mind waiting.

I know she will try again soon in spite of her pain and sorrow.

I have faith in her – she is not a quitter.

Passions

On By cote8050In changes, courage, faith, family, hope, Joy, light, love, love poetry, peace, poetry3 Comments

I know that I love what I love.

My passions are many.

The sound of thunder ignites my soul.

The scent of simmering soup warms my heart.

My passion overflows for clear glass bowls and jars,

Shelves full of home-grown goodness,

Baby smiles and sighs,

Forest trees and critters,

Gardens full of life and love,

Friends and family,

Krishna’s promise of another day of light and joy and

My lover’s heartbeat at midnight.

My passions consume my heart and fill my soul and body

Leaving no room for sadness and negative thoughts as

I have no passion left for them.

Between Seasons

On By cote8050In autumn, changes, earth, faith, garden, growing, light, love, love poetry, nature, peace, poetry, seasons, summer6 Comments

The forest is different now,

Everything has changed.

The sky’s blue is colder,

The north wind is stronger, and

The trees’ summer green has faded.

Their leaves, lighter green now, are studded with hints of red and gold, brown and yellow.

My garden plants are lying over

As if to say “enough”.

They are entitled, they have given me all they can.

But nasturtiums, marigolds and impatients are troopers and refuse to let go.

They will stay strong until the frost’s icy fingers drag them down to rejoin the earth and sleep.

Summer’ song birds have long since flown away, and in their absence

All I hear are the crickets and the crows.

Autumn evenings are chilly and quiet, the silence broken by the occasional lonely bark of a fox and the haunting calls of the owls.

Heavy wind chimes hanging in my forest have been silent all summer but

Now sing with the strength of autumn winds while thistle down floats by in layers of life to be.

This season between the seasons is one of slow change but with an inevitable end.

There is no turning back, no chance to stay and nowhere else to go.

But in spite of this certainty, there is no turmoil, no angst or resistance among the trees and flowers for they know

This is how it should be, how it must be,

How it has always been.

One season losing its grip and

Sliding gently into the next.