The Fabric of Hope

Linking with the Sunday Muse for Muse # 123 brought to us by the utterly amazing talent Chrissa!

Also I am happy to be participating this time for the Flash 55 over at Verse Escape, hosted by the absolutely stunningly talented Joy!

Come join us everyone!

In the distance are the multitudes

Each blemished with their own scars from yesterday

Yet burned by the same light that kept them looking up

Hope is powerful

It hems together the same fabric once torn by heartache

We all hold it within our breast like a blanket

 Some keep holding on

  others let go.

Note: I guess today I am offering a bit of a sad poem.  I  tend to veer away from such realities, but I guess the sad news is, they are realities.  Having had a mother that suffered from addiction, and depression due to by-polar disorder, I saw this at a very young age.  Tomorrow will be the anniversary of the day my mother passed away back in 1972.  I spent many years holding a deep anger over i t.  Then when I became a mother, I truly grieved.  Now, I cherish the thought of her, and hope to be all the beautiful things that she truly was in this life. 

 

Freedom Is as Soft as Feathers and Strong as Wings in Flight,

Artistic Photography Dreamlike Portrait Photography by Damien Casals


Linking with the Sunday Muse for Muse # 119

I hold my freedom close like feathers to a bird

So as not to forget the way it feels upon my chest

For there are souls that never had the ease of those winds to cool their brow

for their days were stifled by the clamor of silent woes

A prison of unheard voices within their chest

I raise my eyes toward heaven holding flags in both hands

my throat full with song and a million different prayers

I am aware of the truth that defines the greatest lines of what could have been

As I sit in the shade of another’s planted tree

Knowing every inconvenience my days have ever held

would certainly be a true luxury to another life.

© Carrie Van Horn 2020

In Bondage to What I Cannot See

Painting by Surrealistic Artist Alexandra Dillon

Linking with the Sunday Muse for Muse # 111

Fear is the highest fence. ~Dudley Nichols

I have touched the truth with weak hands

In bondage to what I cannot see

Collecting pad locks for every door

Even though I have lost the keys

Fear is a lonely prison

Where windows cannot be found

The answers beyond that jail cell

Are muffled by my own shotgun’s round

and freedom is not a bully

It does not beat the front door down

Yet It sings out loud and mighty

To hearts that know the sound.

For I have touched the truth with weak hands

In bondage to what I cannot see

Standing behind a padlocked door
That can be opened by only me.

"The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience."
 ~Emily Dickinson

Note:

I have found that when I succumb to the fear of change and the unknown, two struggles I have always wrestled with, it has always crippled me.  It leaves me paralyzed, and afraid to move forward in any way, like being on a high bridge with no railing when you are scared to death of heights.   Every time I have made myself face it head on, and get out of my comfort zone, I have always been thankful for it later.  It is always an opportunity to grow and broaden my horizons.  Looking back now I know it is always worth the pain it takes to get through it.  This world needs change, and it won't be easy to face it head on, but it will be worth it!

Voices Rising

"Flaming June"  painting by Sir Frederic Leighton

"In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."

~Martin Luther King, Jr

A million voices rise

 like the smoke of fires in June.

 Voices that had been stifled by history.

The past can be a ghost that lingers

 walking through the very walls it builds.

It holds down what should be able to rise.

Smoldering what deserves to be spoken out like a flame reaches up.

How do these lines become so ingrained?

Too stained to be erased?

Burnt beyond the recognition of complacent eyes

in a world of those who choose to sleep in darkness

Let us choose to truly see

 let us then listen

 and not lay down and do nothing,

but rise up in equality

 awake and ready to make a difference

together.

Sharing this with Word Crafters for our prompt, "Flaming June"

We Were Not Meant to Fly Alone

"Rocket" by Brad Phillips

Linking with the Sunday Muse for Muse # 110
Come join us!

“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.”  ~ Mother Teresa

In my dreams I fly with sparrows

never looking down

I think my soul knows

something my mind forgot

we were not meant to fly alone

on this earth I have learned the fear of flying

always staying away from the edge

where is the courage

to explore the truth

and see what was meant to be seen?

when I am awake I walk alone

 into forests that no longer stand

feeling a loss I cannot name

I think my heart knows

something my mind forgot

we all need each other to stand up strong

on this earth I have learned to carry heavy things

and full hands have a hard time reaching out

where is the strength to do what is right

and passion to see it through?

 for in my poems I write of love and freedom

sitting behind a desk

where is the bravery to bear the journey

to venture out where there is a need?

I think my love knows something my mind forgot

we all need each other

and we were not meant to fly alone.

  

  When birds fly in flocks, they many times arrange in specific formations.  When they do this, they work together and take advantage of shifting winds.  This also helps them increase the distance they cover without needing rest.  It seems to me that birds are a lot wiser than us humans.  They see the value in each other and work together to gain a better flight in their journey.  I think we could learn something from them.

I dedicate this to George Floyd, and his grieving family.  As many others in this world, my heart grieves with them.

What the Future Holds

Photography by Anatasiya Dobrovolskaya click HERE for website.

Linking with the Sunday Muse for Muse # 102

The geometry of human progress is an expanding circle of compassion. Every advance in thinking has shown that our relationships extend further than we thought. ~Carl Safina

The red fox runs the autumn river

The black fox leaps the summer wind

The white fox treads the winter snow

Each hunting nimbly to feed their den

We all are diverse hunters

Searching for something more

Longing for a grander purpose

We exit every open door

We are different colored cloths

Part of a grand coat we all must wear

Trying to survive the winter’s rath

And the cold we all must bear

One man’s hungry aching

To hunt down what the future holds

Is part of the fabric of nations

That cover the entire globe.

Pull the Trigger Slow

image credit: Dick Blick Art

The Mag 244

"Life is not lost by dying; life is lost minute by minute, day by dragging day, in all the thousand small uncaring ways." ~Stephen Vincent Benét

Life is fragile like a flower in winter 

yet tough like a loaded gun

 in a world where war and hunger

in some way touches everyone

so hold on to this moment 

hard yet tender like a rose

for there are bullets in the chamber

but pull the trigger and they quickly go.