Journey of the Heart

These past few months have been filled with change for me. After a long struggle with his health, I lost my dear husband, my best friend of 40 years. He was a strong and spiritual man, and even on his worse day saw the glass as half full. Knowing that inspires me each and every day to do the same. He told me once that I had an angel “sitting on my shoulder.” If I didn’t feel it then, I do more than ever now. For the past 10 years I have worked in a healthcare and rehab setting with amazing people who support me and lift me every day, and did the same for my husband the many times he was in their care. But recently, without even realizing I was even searching for a change, I had an offer come to me that I could not refuse. I will still be in healthcare, in a different setting closer to home. In my heart I felt both urgency and need to accept this offer. I’m sure it is the “angel on my shoulder” that led me here. This will be a big change for me, but I carry the memories and friendships ...

Events in our country have been weighing heavily upon me lately... I wrote these words to express how I feel and to rejuvenate my Faith. I share them in hopes that they will find resonance with you and we will know that we are not alone. Great Faith by Diane Bell Mercy... That's all I can think to ask for... It's too much the pain the sadness the injustice the blatant unfairness of it all... Why? How? How did we get here? Has it always been this way? My heart aches... It physically hurts squeezing tighter til I feel that I can't breathe... How can we live if we can't breathe? How can we taste Freedom if we keep our mouths shut? We cling to safety but we are none of us Safe Not if any of us are not Free... Turning away will not bring relief. The truth is still the truth. Facing what is is the only way to bring about what may be... I take solace knowing that so many are paying attention, that many are ready for change. The path forward is bumpy. The path behind ...

  “First, Be Kind” It’s a simple philosophy, on one level, and one I repeat to my children every day: “Be Kind”. If you don’t understand, try to understand. If you still don’t understand, nevertheless, be kind. One of the most famous chapters in the Bible is 1 Corinthians 13, where the writer talks about Love being “the most excellent way”. Verses 12 and 13 say this: “ …For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” I think the point that’s being made is that we can’t always understand – we do see (as another version puts it) “through a glass, darkly”, but we can still have faith, and hope and, above all, we can love. The last few lines of my poem are an exploration of this: “Keep kindness close and let it lead; Keep faith with Love and hope, in deed.” Keeping f...

Life itself is an act of great faith… We only need to take but a small step back to see the vulnerability and fragility of all living things- from the tiny field mouse to the proud human and everything in between- we are all dependent and nourished by the gifts offered to us, overflowing from the unseen hands of our creator. Faith Faith is a tiny, grey field mouse Velvety pink nose sniffing, whiskers twitching Foraging in a vast, flaxen field of wheat Under a shaded, sheet metal sky Faith is a weary farmer Ploughing the fertile land Bedding his seeds in the rich soil With scarred, work roughened hands Faith is a downy sparrow chick Nestled in her forked branch treetop nest Neck outstretched, blind eyes shut tight Beak open wide in expectant anticipation Faith is the golden sun descending Leaving feathery streaks of pastel colors Trailing artfully across the sky Tipping the scales that send the moon on the rise Faith is a tender b...

There are moments when we lose the spirit inside us… ... from one type of loss or another, but we are rewarded with faith, hope and love for ourselves. I Can I can look up at a blue sky like it's here just for me on a day when gray clouds would have pulled me into the ground, the way the earth drinks the rain. I can write my emotions in a poem till I've emptied myself, less weighty, less dispirited over another estranged someone I gave my heart to and had to take it back. I can wake up tomorrow and it will be the next day farther from this one full of intrinsic belief that the sky inside my heart will be blue no matter what. Heather Awad:   I began writing poetry in my early twenties. It started  as a way to express deep emotional feelings I could not release verbally. Very bound by my own voice, poetry became the medium for me to speak. It remained my salvation in healing hurts, and ...