Tag: poem

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Holy Spirit Limpet

Blown By The Spirit

Photographed by myself, Diane Woodrow, whilst I was walking the dog this morning. It was from here that a poem emerged
Abergwyngregyn nature reserve June 2022

This morning I did my regular walk Abergwyngregyn nature reserve. I do this every couple of weeks. It is close enough to home but far enough away that I don’t see anyone I know. It also has a great dog friendly cafe in the village.

I walked and made notes and something about the limpet shells floated past me so I took some photos of them. Since publishing Inspirations From Walking in North Wales and getting such a positive response from those who bought it at the Abergele Arts Festival last weekend, I have been encouraged to work on a new collection.

So I had a few words and ideas about these limpets. I’ve recently done a QEC session around holding tightly to cliques/groups/tribes who are not good for me. So even though these thoughts were not foremost in my mind because when I do this walk I can just let my thoughts wander these things joined together.

But then what came next was James 3:8 where Jesus says to Nicodemus “The wind blows where it wants, and you hear the sound thereof, but can not tell from where it comes, and where it goes: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.“. This comes after Jesus has told Nicodemus he must be “born again”. It is interesting but I have heard many preaches about being born again but very few of being blown wherever the Holy Spirit wills.

But as I pondered the limpet, the letting go of being in toxic groups and of being blown by the spirit, I came up with this poem

No longer holding tightly just to survive

Letting go was not as painful as you thought.

You drifted for a while until you came to land.

Now you lie and let the elements do their work on you.

Day by day, week by week,

with scrunch of food and pound of wave

slowly you are changed.

Then one day you wake and find you are small grains of sand.

It is then and only then

that the wind can pick you up

and blow you where it will

Too often, I think, we wonder why we are not freely flowing within the Holy Spirit. But I do wonder if that is because we are holding on to tightly to the rocks and things like limpets when in fact we should be letting the Creator of the Universe do their stuff and change us into something small enough that can be blown by with gentle wind of the Spirit.

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Everyday Wrods writing prompts

Speak Simply

Pensarn Beach strand. Photographed by Diane Woodrow
Taken this morning [27th April 2022] on my early morning beach walk with the dog

There have been a few ups and downs clouding my outlook and stopping me looking forward to my holiday. One of them, which might sound trivial, is these prompts from Everyday words. As I have said before they are so full and there is so much to think about that I have been doing them slowly. But they are now filling up my inbox and my “get it done” nature is struggling with them all. So I decided to take a new tack and am doing the ones that are most recent. So today I have done today’s prompt even though I still haven’t done Day 10’s. Coming from this approach has stopped me feeling so overwhelmed. I am learning too that sometimes life in general overwhelms me and I have to find a way out.

Preparing for a holiday can overwhelm me. I feel like there are so many things to get done – packing, sorting and preparing things for the animals that are either staying [the cat] or coming with us [the dog]. I feel like I need the house clean and tidy and all the washing done. Some of that comes from wanting to be kind to my future-returning-from-holiday-self, but it does make me panic a bit. This morning I was really pleased when my husband hugged me and thanked me for doing the washing so that there would be clean clothes for the holiday. It is probably from those words that the inspiration for this poem comes from.

Even though the PDF says one thing I am renaming it “Simple Things“. So the prompt comes from my friend Victoria Field’s poem ‘Dandelions’ which can be found in her new book A Speech of Birds. and Sarah’s suggestion of taking the line “Dandelions speak dandelion…. write about what they might say to each other”

My dog walk this morning was filled very much with the simple things of a dog enjoying being on a walk, of the sea and these lovely plants that grow on edge of the shore, of chatting with fellow dog walkers and a friend giving some wise advise. In my preparations for my holiday I need to keep the simple things in focus and not get all ‘Marthaed” and do what doesn’t need to be done.

Categories
Prompts writing

Everyday Words – prompt for 5th April

Photo of stakes and safety nets taken by Diane Woodrow whilst walking with her dog.
Abergwyngregan Nature reserve, 8th April 2022 taken by myself

I like this picture because it is a bit smudged. I took it on Friday when I was out on a long walk, which culminated in coffee and a bacon buttie, with my dog, getting away, getting some headspace and pondering the poem I had started whilst I was working in the pub the day before. The prompt came from Sarah’s Everyday Words prompt for Tuesday 5th. So as you can see I am a long way behind.

I have gone in a totally different direction to the prompt, which as I have said before is not a bad thing. A prompt is to prompt one to write something not to hold one in chains as to what to write. But it also got me thinking about God and the Bible and of how both those can be used not to prompt us to explore but to hold us in chains. How often do we get told that the Bible means X and if we don’t agree when we are wrong? How often do we hear someone’s interpretation and then worry what is wrong with us because we don’t agree?

I very much think that God allowed the Bible, and many other religious texts, to be written as springboards to get us thinking, so see what direction we would head off in. I do not believe there is a right and wrong in interpreting God’s word however it comes it us. I do believe that the base line for it is the commandment that Jesus told us – to love God with everything we have and to love others as ourselves – which is why I would disagree with any war, genocide, abuse, control, etc that is done allegedly “in the name of God”. But with that as our base line then we go onwards and outwards and explore from there.

So as well as creating this little poem that I’ll share with you from Sarah’s prompt I have also had chance to explore God. Again it is amazing what one little carefully thought out prompt can lead.

So the prompt was based on a poem by Mohja Kahf called The Aunty Poem (Mi Privilege Es Su Privilege)  For me it was Sarah’s final suggestion that sent me off on what support and safety nets can mean to me and here is what came to me, Safety Nets. It was good and therapeutic for me to write this, as it often is I find with writing poetry rather than journaling around things as I have said before. But also it excited me to what a prompt can do.

So remember – no right, no wrong – no write, no wrong 🙂

It is also why I’ve just put this prompt up alone because of the “more” I wanted to talk about. But also that the prompt for 6th April has even more meat in it and I’ve been chewing that over all weekend!!!

Categories
accepting Achievement

Share One’s Achievements

Bronze bell jar from Science museum group collection
https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co129140

I wrote a poem a while ago about the above object. I sent it off hoping but not expecting to win anything. But I have! Out of hunderds of poems of a high quality, so many that it took them a week longer to decide which seven poems to publish for National Poetry day, mine was one of those picked.

Check out https://www.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/blog/celebrating-national-poetry-day/ to read mine and the other six.

I had planned to do a blog post today [my hope is that I do at least one post a week regularly, but promise nothing – even to myself 🙂 ] So thought I could share my poem here. My plan was to just share it in a blog post and leave it at that, hoping that people would see it. But then something in me whispered “share it with everyone” and as I am trying to ‘listen to my heart/inner self’ I thought I’d go for it. So it has been shared on Facebook, with those in my writing group, via email to various friends and on to WhatsApp. I might have even shared further but don’t have any other way of sharing.

Yes it has been lovely getting the messages back that say how good the poem is and congratulating me, but what it has also got me thinking is about how often we share our successes.

I think it is more a British thing than an American thing but we too often work on the “don’t be too proud”, “don’t show off”, “be humble”, etc. And then, I don’t know about anyone else, but I get upset when others don’t notice what I’ve done. But then how will they notice what I’ve done if I don’t share it. Yes the email that said ‘Congratulations’ will know that they are some anonymous person who I might never meet. I want/need/expect my friends and family to be proud of me, to be pleased for me, but if I don’t tell them how will they know.

Being one who, a few years ago decided that I’d do New Year Resolutions all throughout the year, I have decided that my 7th October Resolution is to be more open about sharing what I achieve, sharing my success. And my hope from it is that I will start a revolution where we all stop being so self-effacing and to be proud of what we achieve, what we do and most importantly be proud of who we are whether we win competitions, whatever success criteria we base our lives out. Instead let us be proud of who we are, what we can do and get on a be.

I suppose this is a blog that continues from What Have I Achieved? and is now looking at ‘What Am I Achieving Now” and taking it onwards and forwards.

I will finish with a photo of me with Abergele’s mayor and mayoress outside The Gift Shop, Abergele. Alan, the mayor, who is a huge encourager of people, suggested I get in touch with Tracey who runs The Gift Shop to promote my book, The Little Yellow Boat. But not only did he encourage me to do that he then was the first person to come and buy a copy of the book to get it out on Facebook for advertising for this Saturday’s event when I will be in the shop for two hours signing books. He not only encourage but supported too. And I do think that if I am going to go forward with shouting about my achievements I need to also get behind others to shout their achievements, to encourage them and to help us all take a step forward into realising what amazing people we all are and what an amazing world we live in.

Photo of Mayor, Alan Hunter, Mayoress Cheryl Hunter, author Diane Woodrow, her dog Renly, outside The Gift Shop, Abergele promoting Diane's signing of her book on Saturday 9th October 12-2pm
Also found on https://www.facebook.com/LittleYellowBoatBook/
Categories
GodspaceLight Love self-love shared blog

A Love Note by Ana Lisa de Jong

This was originally published on https://godspacelight.com/2021/05/06/a-love-note/ on Thursday 6th May. It fits in so well with my last post that I felt I had to share it with you too.

Do check out https://godspacelight.com/ to read other inspiring posts. And also check out Ana Lisa de Jong on https://livingtreepoetry.com/

A Love Note 2

poem and photos by Ana Lisa de Jong,

A Love Note

I want you to write yourself a love note.
A story of the spirit that lives in you,
rises up,
defies opposition.

I want you to write the inverse of everything
you’ve been told that hurts,
limits,
keeps you sold out to other’s opinions.

Who do you know,
even amongst those who love you,
who see you truly,
who do not see you through a lens imperfect.

You are everything to the one
who perceived you before you stood up,
this one calling, every day, your name,
that you might live unto yourself.

And know that when the darts come
out of the night,
you have a shield, and a counterpart
to every word that isn’t true.

That you have comfort,
when strength is in short supply,
encouragement when
to show up smiling takes every ounce of will.

I want you to write yourself a love note.
From the spirit who lives, breathes in you,
stands up to bless you,
declares against

all that would hurt, intentionally,
inadvertently,
that the words echoing,
might die out on the tongue,

dissolve before they reach the ear,
meet the light,
come undone.

A Love Note 1
Categories
Easter Godspace grief poem

The First Easter Sunday

Also posted on https://godspacelight.com/2021/04/04/the-first-easter-sunday/

Bleak mountain side as the sun rises

Pondering the first Easter Saturday, I wonder what those first disciples must have felt. All their hope was gone, brutally murdered and now hidden in a tomb to rot. For following Jesus they were now rejected by the synagogue leaders and also being watched carefully by the Roman authorities. We know the end of the story we so often forget what that first Saturday after Jesus was crucified was truly like. 

I wrote this poem not only pondering Easter Saturday but also as I was dealing with the grief over the untimely deaths of friends and family I had been praying for God to heal; emotionally, physically and mentally. Pondering Easter Saturday is a good time to think about those prayers we pray that don’t appear to get answered. 

The First Easter Saturday

How? What had happened? 

What is wrong with the world? 

Why is it continuing? 

God why can you not make it stop? 

Just give us time to grieve. 

This is too much. 

There was so much promise. 

So much expectation. 

And now he’s dead. 

All hope of promise is gone. 

It’s over. 

All that we gave our lives for. 

All that we gave up. 

Gone! Over! 

It is finished. 

And who cares? 

Us few that’s who. 

The Passover continues

The people celebrate

They are free at last. 

How? Why? Who could have let this happen?

God how could you have let this happen?

You should have stopped it.

He claimed to be your son.

We believed him.

We are walking dead now. 

They will come to get us soon.

Gone! Over!

It is finished!

So much of our own stories we are in that middle place between God promising and it coming to pass. Even before the pandemic hit most of us had experienced friends and family dying too soon and too painfully. Or of things we hoped would happen not working out as we had desired, or not working out at all. . 

How do we feel when we are grieving, when we are scared and yet other people are celebrating? The Passover was about being free from oppression but the followers of Jesus were under the weight of grief. And grief is a heavy cloak to wear. 

I believe God allowed Easter Saturday to remind us all that we need space to think, to grieve, to wonder. I believe, too, that the church calendar has stolen something from us. When you read what Jesus says it is that he’ll be in the earth three days and nights, not the two nights and one day that our church calendars allow.

Easter is a time for healing, as has been the focus for Godspace. My prayer for us all is that we take some Easter Saturday time and grieve for what we have lost and cope with our uncertainty about the future. I believe taking time out to acknowledge our grief before we move forward is one of the keys to healing and not just brushing things under the carpet. Let’s use Easter Saturday for, what I believe, God intended it.

Poem first published on 31st March 2018 on Aspirational Adventures.

Categories
hope poem shared blog

The Leaves of The Trees

I would like to share a poem by my friend, Julia McGuiness, who is poet in residence at Chester Cathedral. This poem can also be found on The Leaves of The Trees and on the sidebar you can click to find other poems by Julia. I have chosen this one because I feel it fits in with my Review of 2020 and also my posts about Joy and Hope.

The Leaves of the Trees

by Poet in Residence, Julia McGuinness

Trees weep, a fall of leaves
swirled by wind to lost heaps
of silence, of dry beauty.

Scattering unswept, vulnerable
to being trodden, trampled
under indifferent heels.

Bend, humble as a branch.
Lift to the light with tender hand
what weather and time have torn.

The scars leaves bear are cuts
that frame the sky with HOPE.
This holding is for the moment.

Shimmering silver turns to bronze;
leaves shift colour and currency.
Let it go. You too have changed.

The air you breathe is imprinted
with invisible shapes of hope;
love is a gift with holes.

Categories
change Llyn Anafon new normal poem snowdonia

Llyn Anafon

Llyn Anafon taken by me Sunday 27th Sept 2020

Yesterday was the last day of our holiday. It was our first holiday this year due to lockdown. The first 6 days of it were spent in Northumberland in a self-catering cabin, but we had to come home early because we could not stay with friends in the area for the weekend due to the NE of England being in local lockdown. So on Sunday we walked into Snowdonia, away from the tourist crowds and had a picnic Sunday lunch by this beautiful lake where I wrote this poem.

Black mirror broken only by occasional jumping fish trying to catch the last midges of summer.

Blobs of white undefined sheep gather together then drift apart enjoying the last grass of summer. 

Man watches, thinking, pondering, closes eyes & dreams drifting on the last warm rays of summer

Interestingly this could be the last time we see this llyn like this because Welsh Water is draining it and returning it to how it was before it became a reservoir in the 1930s. This will mean they will not have to keep looking after the concrete dam there. But it is interesting how the local people have reacted The extraordinary saga of Snowdonia’s ‘vanishing lake’ that has left people ‘seething’ 

I wish I could find an article that said how the local people reacted when the stream was dammed up in the first place 90 years ago. I wonder if it was with similar outrage? And it got me thinking as to how vehement we can be about change and how it upsets us and yet how quickly we get used to the “new normal”, coin a recent phrase. I wonder if in ten or twenty years we will have got used to local lockdowns and will bemoan them if/when they cease?

You can just see the blobs of sheep across the lake. Taken by me 27th Sept 2020

Categories
accepting being me creativity mindfulness poem shared blog

Poem Published

It’s funny but I never think of myself as a “published writer” and yet once again I’ve had a poem published. This time it was inspired from a Mindfulness course I went on. A part of the course which really struck me was about not judging things as right and wrong but accepting life as it is, which I’m sure I’ve posted on here before but can’t find.

You can find my poem on Michael Townsend William’s site under Listening Mindfully. I won’t republish it here because I’d love if you’d go to Michael’s site, Stillworks,  and see some of the other interesting things that are there. I think too often we don’t network enough to show what other people are doing out there. So here you can find me a “published writer”. And in fact it’s not the first time I’ve been published. I am in Bradford on Avon book about climate change where my poem is found. I do have other places that I’ve been published but I do forget. I wonder why that is? Is it because I just plain don’t remember? Would I remember if I got paid for it? Or is it something deeper? To be honest I really don’t know. And that is the thing, we could all spend ages psychoanalysing ourselves but sometimes we just have to accept where we are. There is nothing wrong with looking at who we are, trying to figure out what makes us tick, but if we use it to put ourselves into boxes of one sort or another we’ve missed the point. To look at myself and how I work, think, behave, and to do that with others, is only helpful if I can be Mindful about it – and accept it as it is without judgement, without having to put what I find into a like/dislike box.