The Gift Within

photo by Gail Swanson

The day my father left this world he left in mid sentence as he was talking to me. Thus began a new world, a world I knew nothing about. And it was a different world then or so it seemed. The world seemed safer but how could that be? We lived in a murderous world even then, a world of assassinations and our young boys being maimed and killed in Viet Nam. It was the beginning of the news being broadcast into our living rooms and that was shocking and horrifying enough.

Could we have ever imagined the continued atrocities we as a nation and the whole world would continue to live through? As we make our way through our own lives and our own personal shocks and losses we as a collective grieve for our brothers and sisters all over the world. We grieve together. We pray together. We try to make sense of the senseless together.

We are weary and grief stricken. We are finding ourselves in a world that is filled with hate and violence. These things have always existed but we are here now living at this particular time, each and every one of us. How do we turn anger and hatred and fear into love? How do we have hope in our hearts in a world gone mad?

Maybe we need to be kinder. Maybe we need to be more loving. Maybe we need to stop judging even the small things. Maybe we need to pray more than ever. And maybe we need to always believe that the beauty of love must be more powerful than any act of hate.

We are living in an extremely powerful time. This is why there is so much going on. Is it a fight between good and evil? Yes it is. As the powers that be continue to try to weaken us through acts of terror we have within each of us a particular gift waiting to be expressed. This is the time to go within. This is the time to bring it forth. Whatever whispers you are hearing about your soul’s purpose, listen. Bring it forth!

Nature soothes and heals and resonates with our true being. Use everything you have, prayer, music, meditation, healing, children, animals, your loved ones.

This particular, individual, unique, personal, sacred gift has an unimaginable power. This gift will emerge and merge with every other magnificent gift and the magnitude of this will change the world. It is changing the world. The time is now.

We will continue to pray and we will continue to hold our center. We will be our highest and best spiritual selves. We were made for this and we shall continue to remember who we are and why we are here.

In deepest sympathy for all enduring such heartless suffering.

May love and peace one day prevail upon this earth.

 

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The Vow

  

for richer for poorer

in sickness and in health

I think the priest

should have screamed that part

and then we should have screamed

for what was to come

for us both

but we went smiling

down the aisle

and into our uncertain future

full of hope….

 it feels as though we have lived many lives

each chapter a different life

some so beautiful it was like a dream

some so heartbreaking we barely survived

 if we could travel back

the babies would be

our finest hour

beautiful round faces

and fat little thighs

eyes of wisdom

saving angels

 but now the house is still

as we sit across the table

with not a single distraction

in the quiet of the room

as we turn to one another

no strangers do we see

just the boy and just the girl

who made a young sweet promise

on a long ago perfect day in May

 little did we know

that the beauty of the vow

would be a gift from heaven

of a love that knows no bounds

 

The Gift

photo by Gail Swanson

The Promise

photo by Gail Swanson

When Love Falls From the Sky

Photo by Gail Swanson

Portal of Love

photo by Gail Swanson

Enter the portal of love
leave behind
everything
but love

The Dark Night

I knew it was coming. There was a miracle on it’s way. I knew it was time. I knew it was predestined. I felt prepared but there can be no preparation for a spiritual breakdown. There can be no preparation for moving back and forward in time where everything is collapsing and emerging at exactly the same time. At first you are as if in a dream because it is truly a dream like state. You feel completely detached as if you are on an island looking through a periscope and everything looks so small and insignificant and at the same time silently underneath volcanoes are erupting.

There was nothing to grab onto. There was no frame of reference. There were elements of the dark night. I was lost in a sea of complete detachment and yet the most excruciating emotion. I have never felt so alone. I have never felt more as if I were fighting desperately for something I was not even sure of.

Everything I have ever been came clamoring. Everything I wish to be was before me and yet I remained in this limbo for weeks unsure of everything and everyone. There was no thinking. There was just surviving. This was a state of being. This was a physical, mental, spiritual crisis. I am not at all sure how I made it through.

There were no revelations. There were no hints or clues of anything. I was in a void, just being and feeling. I felt completely desperate. I felt I needed to be in a convent or a monastery or a cave. This is what I thought of constantly.

So the miracle was sent. Precious words and memories were exchanged. And then that defining undeniable sentence was spoken. It was quiet and beautiful and then it began to pick up wind and became a tornado swirling all around me.

In an instant it changed everything. Slowly the unraveling began. Systematically the universe responded. Everything I had seen, everything I had heard, seeped into my cells and into my bones. Fight or flight. There is nowhere to run. I am left to weather the storm.

It almost seems like a dream now but it was real and true and necessary. I still do not understand a bit of it and perhaps I never will. I only know that when you call out for years on end “I will do what is asked of me” you better mean it.

Breathe

can you feel the merging of worlds
of lives
can you feel the strength required
for times such as these
are you brokenhearted
are you holding your breath
Breathe
the breath is our companion
on the journey
the breath is the wayshower
the divine wind of transformation
of transmutation
Breathe
and Remember
for every breath ever taken
has brought you to this time and place
of truth
and discovery
and reclamation