Journey of the Heart

A Morning in May                                  by Shanon Grau There’s a restless heart underneath spring soil, with its May mornings that want to give you warmth but barely know the sun yet, and its gliding barn swallows who think they are bats in the light of day. There’s a sudden epiphany- and a sort of sun-kissed confusion from a seed that has only known the dark, but gives rise to the purple splendor of an iris, while the barn swallow flies by and finally realizes it’s a bird, and takes in the sun on a slowly warming morning in May. Sharon Grau:   I am a Licensed Massage Therapist who lives near the sea in Asbury Park, NJ. I grew up in the midland/central NJ area but in 2015, I made the choice to move closer to the Atlantic Ocean. Ever since I was a little girl I have been enchanted by the natural world; at the age of 12, I began trying to describe this enchantment t...

I Wish I Had Wings                by Janavi Held (1965-2018)   I wish I had wings! I'd leave this prison of gravity behind  and go up, and up,  grazing the tops of  dazzling green trees,  swaying in the wind.  I'd soar through  the mists of bright clouds  breathing in freedom,  and moist particles  of fog and rain.  I'd turn my face to the sun:  warm. . .  warming my insides, breaking the prison  of flesh and bone  wide open.  I'd bathe in sweet moon rays and drink  the dust of stars  filling my heart  with ancient light. I'd look down  at the swarming  Earth, but I'd never  look back. ~This poem appears in the author's posthumous poetry collection, Whispers From Her Deathbed (Golden Dragonfly Press, 2022), which you can pre-order by clicking here. .~   Janavi Held  (1965-2018) was a soulful dancer, artist, poet, photographer and...