butterflies linger
long after Autumn drops leaves
memories fading
Category: poetry
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2019/11/a-ghost/
Jul 14 2016
for lost friends
For Lost Friends
As twilight makes a rainbow robe
From the concealed colors of day
In order for time to stay alive
Within the dark weight of night,
May we lose no one we love
From the shelter of our hearts.
When we love another heart
And allow it to love us,
We journey deep below time
Into that eternal weave
Where nothing unravels.
May we have the grace to see
Despite the hurt of rupture,
The searing of anger,
And the empty disappointment,
that whoever we have loved,
Such love can never quench.
Though a door may have closed,
Closed between us,
May we be able to view
Our lost friends with eyes
Wise with calming grace;
Forgive them the damage
We were left to inherit;
Free ourselves from the chains
Of forlorn resentment;
Bring warmth again to
Where the heart has frozen
In order that beyond the walls
Of our cherished hurt
And chosen distance
We may be able to
Celebrate the gifts they brought,
Learn and grow from the pain,
And prosper into difference,
Wishing them the peace
Where spirit can summon
Beauty from wounded space.
– John O’Donohue (from To Bless the Space Between Us)
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2016/07/for-lost-friends/
May 18 2016
How To Be Alone
found via PostSecret FB:
This is something I’m having to figure out again. Eight years in a relationship. Five years of living together. Done in what seems like an instant. I was talking to my mom last night and I told her “in a way, its like A died, at least in regards to me.” Only it might be more difficult than if she had died, because she’s still around. I could easily run into her (especially since she moved somewhere right next to where I am often). I imagine she’ll do everything she can to avoid me if she sees me based on how she’s acted since she left, but the possibility is there nonetheless.
I’ve been alone before. Its ok to be alone. Its just something I have to get used to again for now.
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2016/05/how-to-be-alone/
Apr 16 2016
cut flower
crossposted from one simple breath (a haiku community):
Photo by Pathan Jomazo
beautiful flowers
grown with gentle care are cut
killed for our pleasure
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2016/04/cut-flower/
Feb 29 2016
February 29
FEBRUARY 29
An extra day —
Like the painting’s fifth cow,
who looks out directly,
straight toward you,
from inside her black and white spots.
An extra day —
Accidental, surely:
the made calendar stumbling over the real
as a drunk trips over a threshold
too low to see.
An extra day —
With a second cup of black coffee.
A friendly but businesslike phone call.
A mailed-back package.
Some extra work, but not too much —
just one day’s worth, exactly.
An extra day —
Not unlike the space
between a door and its frame
when one room is lit and another is not,
and one changes into the other
as a woman exchanges a scarf.
An extra day —
Extraordinarily like any other.
And still
there is some generosity to it,
like a letter re-readable after its writer has died.
From The Beauty by Jane Hirshfield (via Brain Pickings)
By date at least, I only have half birthdays once every 4 years. Today is my 10th half birthday. Weird. I know half birthdays are something for kids…but with mine being on the leap day…its kind of interesting to me in a way I can’t quite explain.
I’m not quite sure whether or not an extra day is a gift or a curse this year yet. That will be something to be determined later. I am still hopeful that 2016 will be a good year.
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2016/02/february-29/
Feb 01 2016
one simple breath: Winter
Photo by: Daniel Parks License: CC by-nc
relentlessly it
rains depression. obscuring
moments of lightness.
a prompt from onesimplebreath.com
I’ve got a new web project going on. Its a haiku community where there will be semi-regular prompts to write haikus. Anyone is welcome to join and participate. Please check out the site at the links above.
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2016/02/one-simple-breath-winter/
Jan 31 2013
This Is How You Lose Her
the epigraph from Junot Díaz’s novel This Is How You Lose Her.
From the poem “One Last Poem for Richard” by Sandra Cisneros
(reblogged from booksmatter)
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2013/01/this-is-how-you-lose-her/
Nov 27 2012
Three Things To Remember
As long as you’re dancing, you can
break the rules.
Sometimes breaking the rules is just
extending the rules.
Sometimes there are no rules.
— Mary Oliver
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2012/11/three-things-to-remember/
Oct 20 2011
Moon
Moon
I am so delighted
With you, because I know you
And I know you
Came down to me, answering.
I walked up hill
After you went all the way down.
I hadn’t seen too,
But I believed in you,
And I believed you were dividing three cones
Of sky down beyond
The left shoulder of the white oak
In Warnock,
Ohio, and I remember and I pray
Come down to me love and bring me
One panther of silver and one happy
Evening of snow,
And I will give you
My life, my own, and now
My beloved has come to me and we have gone walking
Below you beside the East
River in the snow, all
Three of us, leaving
Six prints of panther, kind
Woman, and happy
Man,
And I love you,
Sky full of laurels and arrows,
White shadow of cities where the scars
Of forgotten swans
Waken into feathers
And new leaves.
—James Wright
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2011/10/moon/
Oct 18 2011
Love in a Warm Room in Winter
Love in a Warm Room in Winter
The trouble with you is
You think all I want to do
Is get you into bed
And make love with you.
And that’s not true!
I was just trying to make friends.
All I wanted to do
Was get into bed
With you and make
Love with you.
Who was that little bird we saw towering upside down
This afternoon on that pine cone, on the edge of a cliff,
In the snow? Wasn’t he charming? yes, he was, now,
Now, now,
Just take it easy.
Aha!
— James Wright
Permanent link to this article: https://www.rhinoblues.com/thoughts/2011/10/love-in-a-warm-room-in-winter/
