Thursday, June 17, 2010

Paying Tribute to Great Blue Heron


What an incredible event to see a Great Blue Heron not once, not twice, but three times within a week!. Really. Once flying overhead (in a rainstorm, no less) when I was coming out of the YMCA, and then twice at the reservoir. Witnessing the flight of this beatuful beast has left me awe struck, inspired and very tuned into it's unique, and oh-so-relevant- message. Thank You Great Blue Heron, for flying into my life.



Heron medicine is the power of knowing the self by discovering its gifts and facing its challenges. It is the ability to accept all feelings and opinions without denying any emotion or thought. Heron flies over those who are unaware of who they are and where they belong in the world. Gently dropping a blue feather to them, Heron asks that they follow their intuition and begin the empowering journey of self-realization.


If the great Blue Heron has flown into your cards today, it is urging you to dive into the watery world of feelings to seek your truth. Heron teaches you to develop your self-reflective skills so that you may come to know yourself in an intimate way. Looking at yourself through the filmy lens of self-importance, the cloudy perceptions of low self-worth, or the myopic eyes of self-pity, you will never understand your true potential or appreciate the opportunities that appear.

Heron asks that you examine yourself with a cold eye to see what you wish to improve and how you want to change. If you get stuck in the process, it may be a sign that you are being too hard or critical. Choosing to blame others and constantly pointing a finger at life's situations, instead of claiming responsibility for your actions, shows that you lack the courage to face the enemy within.

Heron medicine people are willing to look at themselves and see the truth of their motives, actions, feelings, dreams, goals, inner strengths, and inner weaknesses. In balancing those truths, Heron's medicine shows you how to meet the challenges of your personal weaknesses and how to continue developing the skills that lead to inner strength and certainty of purpose.

Are you willing to dive into the watery depths of your own feelings and discover the role of your spiritual essence? Heron is now calling you to delve deeper, to know yourself, and to trust your path. Like the Phoenix, who rises from its own ashes, Heron emerges from the unseen worlds of spirit into a new balanced sense-of-self in order to embrace its potential again and again.

The magnificence of your human spirit lies waiting for the joy of discovery, if you are courageous enough to follow the Waterbird throughout the journey. Heron reminds you that every traveler on life's journey is a messenger, and that every destination is the beginning of a new life cycle on the Medicine Wheel.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Was You Ever Bit By A Dead Bee?


“How Little We Know”



                                     Maybe it happens this way, maybe we really belong together
But after all, how little we know
Maybe it's just for a day, love is as changeable as the weather
And after all, how little we know...
Maybe you're meant to be mine, maybe I'm only supposed
To stay in your arms awhile as others have done
Is this what I've waited for - Am I the one?
Oh, I hope in my heart that it's so
In spite of how little we know.



For all the persistent, yet hopeful  romantics out there who simply go ga-ga for a great old time movie. I finally watched "To Have and Have Not", and it was pretty darn good. Interesting story, decent script, and of course, that undeniable spark between Bogey and Bacall make the whole movie incredible. I got a special kick out of the scene when Slim gives Steve a playful smack in the face (HA!) after he finally kisses her, immediately followed by the comment about him needing a shave. I never knew about that scene... A classic, really. Here's to Steve & Slim. :)



Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Great Book. Finished it in Two Days.


This is where I got the quote, that gave me the inspiration for the poem "Charisma". Totally awesome book, and totally relevant (to me, now) issues that it deals with. I never would have known about Haruki Marukami, if not for the poetry site...gotta love it.

“‘For a while’ is a phrase whose length can’t be measured. At least by the person who’s waiting.”- Haruki Murakami, South of the Border, West of the Sun.

Sunday, June 6, 2010

Art Journaling

Many of the blogs I regularly read feature art journaling -  combining written thoughts with visual thought. It is such a wonderful means of expression, and one that I have been trying to create for myself for a long time. Each poem has a 'picture'...each painting has a verse, but I have only been able to technically combine the two when I do journal covers or mixed media art. Since I've seen so much simple beauty in art journaling, I decide to give it a whirl. The pieces here were created with my journal thought is mind...some old, some new, but  I really enjoy this type of expression.


Last December, I set out to meet strangers of an art community with my artwork . I was doing this to meet creative folks, and to try and find a way back into a creative community, as well as to fill some perceived void I had been experiencing. But, once I got there, (after getting lost and being late), I realized that not only was I not ready to put myself and my artwork 'out there', but also that meeting the group was not quite as important as I thought. After deciding not to go in, and forgiving myself for it,  I was overwhelmed with a sense -  a need -  to get home. Realizing how 'ok' my life was ; how I tended to take for granted all the 'little' things of my daily life, but how they really were my life at the moment, struck me deeply. The above 'quilt' illustration above was a quick way for me to put a visual, to these words: "Time to say "ah, so what" to the minutia that threatens my quest for creative bliss and familial happiness and romantic togetherness. That minutia must be very distinctly separated from what I am fondly calling 'the hours'. The hours are the times, the minutes and moments, that define my life...it is not in the great variance of emotions that we really experience life (TRUE, we may remember those more clearly, feel them more deeply, for they are the sequins and bows, the rips and tears of our life's quilt) but it is in the daily ins and outs, in the mundane, and in the routine, that we weave our silken coverlet that secures us, protects us, gives us warmth, and comforts us.


I had the good fortune to exchange emails with an old friend last spring. Both of us were pondering 'where we're at' in life, etc...and at that time, I was feeling very much like a stranger in my own life. I was beginning to feel in tune with something that was either lost in me and I was re-experiencing, or something totally new... I'm still not sure. But what I had to say to my friend about this feeling of connection is summed up below, and illustrated in my art journal water color above. "Have you ever been asked about that thriving undercurrent that pulses even when we wish it would not; when it complicates, and creates questions that we didn't know existed? It's that desperate need to align with, be absorbed by and entirely empowered by connectedness; it's that internal voice that asks "And now what?"


The above watercolor journal page was part of an answer to a question regarding simplifying life. Once, someone said to me that "everyone has the potential to do one thing very well...and with great joy (remarkably, it was actually two people I've known who shared this exact philosophy) and my response to this was long...but part of it had allot to do with forgetting oneself; what happens when one's life changes drastically. For me, this was having three babies at one time. My most poignant thought from those journal entries I've illustrated above, and  it is this: "Losing the center of myself wasn't hard to do - it is in the redefining of my 'self' that has given me pause."

What kind of creative endeavors do you know of that combine the written word with visuals? I love to learn about people who enjoy expressing themselves in this way.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

3rd Gold, Baby!!

I was pretty excited and very surprised to discover that I won the gold for this latest poetry contest. There were less than 10 of us that entered, and all of the other contestants were pretty well seasoned poets -some published- and have been site members for years. Unlike allot of the contests sponsored on the poetry site, this one was very specifically structured, and had been well thought out and researched by its creator, who is obviously a huge fan of a writer named Haruki Murakami. The contest was geared around quotes from various novels by Haruki Murakami and, after doing some of my own digging, I found out he is considered an important figure in postmodern literature, and was praised as one of the "world's greatest living novelists”. The quote I chose was from his novel “South of the Border, West of the Sun” and was a no-brainier segue for me to pen Charisma. (check out my FaceBook note “25 Random Things”, number 16 from January 2009)



QUOTE PROMPT: “I was always attracted not by some quantifiable, external beauty, but by something deep down, something absolute. Just as some people have a secret love for rainstorms, earthquakes, or blackouts, I liked that certain undefinable something directed my way by members of the opposite sex. For want of a better word, call it magnetism. Like it or not, it’s a kind of power that snares people and reels them in”.

My response to the prompt, and the gold trophy winner:
 
Charisma

forceful pulling magnetic spell
draw me deeper into your personal realm.
Inimitable lure - you are walking sex
my gaze never straying from your
lightning eyes and rouge full lips
entranced by your enthusiastic mannerisms
classic wit and style concoct bewitching charm
instrumental in creating the mix:
sweetly, playfully smart melds into
attitudes alluring and coy,
preceding searing sultriness.
your tasty recipe always irresistible...
one bite and I am lightheaded,
unfocused, giddy, high as a kite,
uttering nonsensical speech; drooling-
salivating for my next bite of visceral chaos.

Despite its slight toxicity,
Your charisma is addictive.