Sometimes People Come Into Your Life – Author Unknown

Sometimes people come into your life and you know
right away that they were meant to be there, to serve
some sort of purpose, teach you a lesson, or to help
you figure out who you are or who you want to become.

You never know who these people may be – a roommate, a
neighbor, a professor, a friend, a lover, or even a
complete stranger – but when you lock eyes with them,
you know at that very moment they will affect your
life in some profound way.

Sometimes things happen to you that may seem horrible,
painful, and unfair at first, but in reflection you
find that without overcoming those obstacles you would
have never realized your potential, strength,
willpower, or heart.

Illness, injury, love, lost moments of true greatness,
and sheer stupidity all occur to test the limits of
your soul. Without these small tests, whatever they
may be, life would be like a smoothly paved straight
flat road to nowhere. It would be safe and
comfortable, but dull and utterly pointless.

The people you meet who affect your life, and the
success and downfalls you experience, help to create
who you are and who you become. Even the bad
experiences can be learned from. In fact, they are
sometimes the most important ones.

If someone loves you, give love back to them in
whatever way you can, not only because they love you,
but because in a way, they are teaching you to love
and how to open your heart and eyes to things.

If someone hurts you, betrays you, or breaks your
heart, forgive them, for they have helped you learn
about trust and the importance of being cautious to
whom you open your heart.

Make every day count. Appreciate every moment and take
from those moments everything that you possibly can
for you may never be able to experience it again. Talk
to people that you have never talked to before, and
listen to what they have to say.

Let yourself fall in love, break free, and set your
sights high. Hold your head up because you have every
right to. Tell yourself you are a great individual and
believe in yourself, for if you don’t believe in
yourself, it will be hard for others to believe in
you.

You can make anything you wish of your life. Create
your own life and then go out and live it with
absolutely no regrets.

And if you love someone tell them, for you never know
what tomorrow may have in store.

Learn a lesson in life each day that you live! Today
is the tomorrow you were worried about yesterday. Was
it worth it?

author unknown

You Raise Me Up

Sunsets From Around the World

The Definition of Love – Andrew Marvell

My Love is of a birth as rare
As ’tis for object strange and high:
It was begotten by Despair
Upon Impossibility.

Magnanimous Despair alone
Could show me so divine a thing,
Where feeble Hope could ne’er have flown
But vainly flapped its Tinsel wing.

And yet I quickly might arrive
Where my extended soul is fixt,
But Fate does iron wedges drive,
And always crowds itself betwixt.

For Fate with jealous eye does see
Two perfect Loves; nor lets them close:
Their union would her ruin be,
And her tyrannic power depose.

And therefore her decrees of steel
Us as the distant Poles have placed,
(Though Love’s whole World on us doth wheel)
Not by themselves to be embraced.

Unless the giddy Heaven fall,
And Earth some new convulsion tear;
And, us to join, the World should all
Be cramped into a planisphere.

As lines so Loves oblique may well
Themselves in every angle greet:
But ours so truly parallel,
Though infinite can never meet.

Therefore the Love which us doth bind,
But Fate so enviously debars,
Is the conjunction of the Mind,
And opposition of the Stars.

She Walks In Beauty – Lord Byron

She walks in beauty, like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies;

And all that’s best of dark and bright

Meet in her aspect and her eyes;

Thus mellowed to that tender light

Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,

Had half impaired the nameless grace

Which waves in every raven tress,

Or softly lightens o’er her face;

Where thoughts serenely sweet express,

How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,

The smiles that win, the tints that glow,

But tell of days in goodness spent,

A mind at peace with all below,

A heart whose love is innocent!

 

Reflections from Around the World

Mesmerize

Your voice, like a river rippling

with waves of goose bumps,

awaken my inner spirit and fill me with delight.

Your gaze, magnetic, blue and moonlight bright,

clear as the evening night, gently captures my inner light.

Your heart, speaks softly and soulfully,

whispering faithfully and sometimes silently,

but never in spite.

Your touch, captivating, tranquil and slight,

caressing me slowly, surrounding me with all of your might.

Your smile, brilliant and bright,

tantalizing like a steamy, summer night,

summoning me gently to be your wife.

Heather Mirassou

A Love Poem – Emily Dickensen

Love’s Philosophy – Percy Bysshe Shelley

The fountains mingle with the river,
And the rivers with the ocean;
The winds of heaven mix forever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In another’s being mingle–
Why not I with thine?

See, the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister flower could be forgiven
If it disdained its brother;
And the sunlight clasps the earth,
And the moonbeams kiss the sea;–
What are all these kissings worth,
If thou kiss not me?

Maya Angelou – Phenomenal Woman

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can’t touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can’t see.
I say,
It’s in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I’m a woman

Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
‘Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

How Do I love Thee? Let Me Count The Ways – Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise,
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints -I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! -and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

Love To My Husband

I am drawn to you like
The stars to the midnight skies
The Earth to the burning sun
Water to thirsting flowers
I am comfortable with you like
An old pair of boots

A faded pair of jeans
My favorite sweater and scarf
I am at peace with you like
Sitting in a boat in the middle of a lake
Taking a walk in silence in the country
Listening to rain drops fall in the dark of night

I am alive with you
Like the laughter that is uncontrollable
The heart that goes thump, thump, thump
Running through wildflowers in the wilderness
Every ounce of my being

Mind, body and soul are riveted by you
I am alive with you, free with you,

comfortable with you I love you

Heather Mirassou

Fear of Losing You

No longer eyes, a deep blue sea abyss;

instead a blank, bored stare.

No longer drowning, luscious kisses;

only an obligatory one, which is hurried and quick.

No longer hand in hand:

now drifting like clouds and walking moonbeams of miles apart.

No longer two hearts tied tightly on a string;

only lonely and confused hearts on a noose.

No longer lingering loving touches;

just pleading glances of loneliness.

No longer dreams of us together;

instead a future of unsteady uncertainty.

No longer a confident, loving wife;

only a sad, lonely woman afraid of losing you.

Heather Mirassou

The Invitation by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Best and brightest, come away,

Fairer far than this fair day,

Which, like thee, to those in sorrow

Comes to bid a sweet good-morrow

To the rough year just awake

In its cradle on the brake.

The brightest hour of unborn Spring

Through the Winter wandering,

Found, it seems, the halcyon morn

To hoar February born;

Bending from Heaven, in azure mirth,

It kissed the forehead of the earth,

And smiled upon the silent sea,

And bade the frozen streams be free,

And waked to music all their fountains,

And breathed upon the frozen mountains,

And like a prophetess of May

Strewed flowers upon the barren way,

Making the wintry world appear

Like one on whom thou smilest, dear.

Away, away, from men and towns,

To the wild wood and the downs -

To the silent wilderness

Where the soul need not repress

Its music, lest it should not find

An echo in another’s mind,

While the touch of Nature’s art

Harmonizes heart to heart.

Radiant Sister of the Day

Awake! arise! and come away!

To the wild woods and the plains,

To the pools where winter rains

Image all their roof of leaves,

Where the pine its garland weaves

Of sapless green, and ivy dun,

Round stems that never kiss the sun,

Where the lawns and pastures be

And the sandhills of the sea,

Where the melting hoar-frost wets

The daisy-star that never sets,

And wind-flowers and violets

Which yet join not scent to hue

Crown the pale year weak and new;

When the night is left behind

In the deep east, dim and blind,

And the blue noon is over us,

And the multitudinous

Billows murmur at our feet,

Where the earth and ocean meet,

And all things seem only one

In the universal Sun.

Breath In The Sky

First Kiss

Long after we met

Still standing in forever

Our kindred spirits released

Beyond our wildest desires

To find love alone together

For I found you there

In nights glow lights

Full of moon beams

Shed of inhibitions

With no one to see

I kissed you secretly

Under the naked tree

Webbed in shadows

Embraced yet still free

For I found you there

In the warmth of the eve

Without a summer breeze

To be dancing in the droplets

Of Nectar sweet as a honey bee

Subtle light and free

To fly with you in dreams

Relished natures fantasy

Will blush my heart

When our lips touch

For I found you there

Heather Mirassou

Ode to a Woman Gardening – by Pablo Neruda

Yes, I knew that your hands were
a budding sprout, a lily
of silver:
you had something to do
with the soil,
with the flowering of the earth,
but when
I saw you digging, digging,
pushing pebbles apart
and guiding roots
I knew at once,
my farming woman,
that not only
your hands
but your heart
were of earth,
that there
you were
making
your things,
touching
moist
doorways
through which
the seeds circulate.

So in this way
from one plant
to the other
recently
planted one,
with your face
spotted
with a kiss
from the clay,
you went
and came back
flowering,
you went
and from your hand
the stem
of the astromeria
raised its solitary elegance,
the jasmine
adorned
the mist on your brow
with stars of dew and fragrance.

Everything
grew from you
penetrating
into the earth
and becoming
green light,
foliage and power
you communicated
your seeds to it,
my beloved,
red gardening woman:
your hand
on familiar terms
with the earth
and the bright growing
was instantaneous.
Love, thus also
your hand
of water,
your heart of earth,
gave fertility
and strength to my songs
you touch
my chest
while I sleep
and trees blossom
from my dreaming.
I wake up, open my eyes,
and you have
inside me
stars in the shadows
which will rise and shine
in my song.

That’s how it is, gardening woman:
our love is earthly:
your mouth is a plant of light, a corolla,
my heart works among the roots.

 

Mistress

Amorous kisses and tricks

Give way to a strangers desire

The willing mistress

awaits a man for her game

No love need be adorned

Only sinful seduction performed

She captivates and bewitches

Engulfed in her charms

No longer listless and calm

The truth of the immoral act

Haunts them with fear and shame

Their hearts drown as they quickly depart

Heather Mirassou

First Love – John Clare

I ne’er was struck before that hour
With love so sudden and so sweet,
Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower
And stole my heart away complete.
My face turned pale as deadly pale.
My legs refused to walk away,
And when she looked, what could I ail?
My life and all seemed turned to clay.

And then my blood rushed to my face
And took my eyesight quite away,
The trees and bushes round the place
Seemed midnight at noonday.
I could not see a single thing,
Words from my eyes did start –
They spoke as chords do from the string,
And blood burnt round my heart.

Are flowers the winter’s choice?
Is love’s bed always snow?
She seemed to hear my silent voice,
Not love’s appeals to know.
I never saw so sweet a face
As that I stood before.
My heart has left its dwelling-place
And can return no more

A Rose Within

A certain woman planted a rose

and watered it faithfully,

and before it blossomed,

she examined it.

She saw the bud that would soon

blossom and also the thorns.

And she thought,

“How can any beautiful flower

come from a plant burdened with

so many sharp thorns?”

Saddened by this thought,

she neglected to water the rose,

and before it was ready to

bloom, it died.

So it is with many people.

Within every soul there is a rose.

The God-like qualities planted in us

at birth grow amid the thorns of our faults.

Many of us look at ourselves and

see only the thorns, the defects.

We despair, thinking that nothing

good can possibly come from us.

We neglect to water the good within us,

and eventually it dies.

We never realize our potential.

Some people do not see

the rose within themselves;

someone else must show it to them.

One of the greatest gifts a person

can possess is to be able to

reach past the thorns

and find the rose within others.

This is the characteristic of love,

to look at a person, and knowing his faults,

recognize the nobility in his soul,

and help him realize that he can

overcome his faults.

If we show him the rose,

he will conquer the thorns.

Then will he blossom,

blooming forth thirty, sixty,

a hundred-fold as it is given to him.

Our duty in this world is to help others

by showing them their roses

and not their thorns.

Only then can we achieve

the love we should feel for each other;

only then can we bloom in our own garden.

Recognizing Her Own Beauty…

A Prayer For My Daughter – William Butler Yeats

Once more the storm is howling, and half hid
Under this cradle-hood and coverlid
My child sleeps on. There is no obstacle
But Gregory’s wood and one bare hill
Whereby the haystack- and roof-levelling wind,
Bred on the Atlantic, can be stayed;
And for an hour I have walked and prayed
Because of the great gloom that is in my mind.

I have walked and prayed for this young child an hour
And heard the sea-wind scream upon the tower,
And under the arches of the bridge, and scream
In the elms above the flooded stream;
Imagining in excited reverie
That the future years had come,
Dancing to a frenzied drum,
Out of the murderous innocence of the sea.

May she be granted beauty and yet not
Beauty to make a stranger’s eye distraught,
Or hers before a looking-glass, for such,
Being made beautiful overmuch,
Consider beauty a sufficient end,
Lose natural kindness and maybe
The heart-revealing intimacy
That chooses right, and never find a friend.

Helen being chosen found life flat and dull
And later had much trouble from a fool,
While that great Queen, that rose out of the spray,
Being fatherless could have her way
Yet chose a bandy-leggèd smith for man.
It’s certain that fine women eat
A crazy salad with their meat
Whereby the Horn of Plenty is undone.

In courtesy I’d have her chiefly learned;
Hearts are not had as a gift but hearts are earned
By those that are not entirely beautiful;
Yet many, that have played the fool
For beauty’s very self, has charm made wise,
And many a poor man that has roved,
Loved and thought himself beloved,
From a glad kindness cannot take his eyes.

May she become a flourishing hidden tree
That all her thoughts may like the linnet be,
And have no business but dispensing round
Their magnanimities of sound,
Nor but in merriment begin a chase,
Nor but in merriment a quarrel.
O may she live like some green laurel
Rooted in one dear perpetual place.

My mind, because the minds that I have loved,
The sort of beauty that I have approved,
Prosper but little, has dried up of late,
Yet knows that to be choked with hate
May well be of all evil chances chief.
If there’s no hatred in a mind
Assault and battery of the wind
Can never tear the linnet from the leaf.

An intellectual hatred is the worst,
So let her think opinions are accursed.
Have I not seen the loveliest woman born
Out of the mouth of Plenty’s horn,
Because of her opinionated mind
Barter that horn and every good
By quiet natures understood
For an old bellows full of angry wind?

Considering that, all hatred driven hence,
The soul recovers radical innocence
And learns at last that it is self-delighting,
Self-appeasing, self-affrighting,
And that its own sweet will is Heaven’s will;
She can, though every face should scowl
And every windy quarter howl
Or every bellows burst, be happy still.

And may her bridegroom bring her to a house
Where all’s accustomed, ceremonious;
For arrogance and hatred are the wares
Peddled in the thoroughfares.
How but in custom and in ceremony
Are innocence and beauty born?
Ceremony’s a name for the rich horn,
And custom for the spreading laurel tree.

Son and Father

A father adoring eyes
Expressions of love
Kindness and compassion
A father mentoring
patience and understanding
strength and courage
A father who is fun
laughs and runs
plays with his son
A father who listens
meek and mild
open-minded and moral
Be proud father
Your son is a scholar
And an agile athlete
Be proud father
Your son is a vision of you
who will carry your traits
Be proud father
Your son shows your heart
soul and spirit
Be proud father
Your son an incredible young man
the world is in his hands
Be proud father
Your son has a dream
he is a miracle of you

Heather Mirassou

I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You – by Pablo Neruda

Pablo Neruda (via last.fm)

I do not love you except because I love you;
I go from loving to not loving you,
From waiting to not waiting for you
My heart moves from cold to fire.I love you only because it’s you the one I love;
I hate you deeply, and hating you
Bend to you, and the measure of my changing love for you
Is that I do not see you but love you blindly.

Maybe January light will consume
My heart with its cruel
Ray, stealing my key to true calm.

In this part of the story I am the one who
Dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you,
Because I love you, Love, in fire and blood.

A Lesson…

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day he saw a small opening in the cocoon. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and could go no further… so, the man decided to help the butterfly.
He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon. The butterfly then emerged easily. But, it had a swollen body, and small shriveled wings. He continued to watch the butterfly, because he expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to support the body, which would contract in time. Neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings. It was never able to fly.
What he had done in his well intentioned kindness and haste and what he did not understand, was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required to get through the tiny opening were God’s way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from the cocoon.
Sometimes, struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If nature allowed us to go through our life without any obstacles, it would cripple us. We would not be as strong as we could have been, and we could never fly.