#MicroPoetry|August ’19 Reflections

Life’s not easy – I think that’s a universal experience. There are indeed gifts and blessings in the journey we experience as creatures who are bound to time. Inevitably, there will be pain and loss, but that, I do not believe, is a sentence. Rather, as this verse explores, how we view this linear journey determines what we shall see. In the paradox, therefore, of living with finite amount of time, do we see opportunities or confinement?

How much energy do you feel it takes to keep others at a distance?
What benefit is there in limiting our access to different thoughts and ideas?
It might be tempting to think that keeping ourselves isolated is safe, perhaps even helpful. It has been experience, however, that our journey as a species are intermingled to a point that we are shaped by a diversity over the eons. In this poetic musing I explore diversity as one way to appreciate what Love is …

Doubt and tomorrow are often intertwined to a point we do not even notice the connexions. What possibilities might be, can easily be obscured by distrust in the power of hope, imagination and faith. This verse journeys through what tomorrow might look like if we saw possibility, as opposed to suspicion in why things cannot be …

The play between limits and the impossible seems – to me – an intriguing conversation. I assume we often think of them as bookends, opposites or standing in opposition to one another. In this musing, however, I wonder how considering limitations might point to ways the impossible might Be.
How might considering the challenges we face help us to recognise the possible impossibilities that might be?

Greatness has become a word experienced as bellicose, grandiose and even egotistical. It is one of those words that can and does posses power. Though all words do, some are charged in a way that helps us aspire or collectively diminished. By challenging the currently charged manner in which ‘great’ is used, I would like to suggest that it is in the intention to care and our ability to hear from others that which is painful or challenging, that we collectively attain greatness together.

It is often a temptation to be future orientated. Whether that’s with our families, our vocations, and friends. Dreaming about what might be can be motivating. It can also detract from this moment in which we find ourselves. More pointedly, sometimes when we keep focused on the horizon, we can lose track of the path that we must follow now. Sometimes when we fail to be here Now, we might find we missed moments to actually nurture that future toward which we might be journeying.

I often receive the gift of trust from people who are discerning what is it that they bring that is a blessing to themselves, family & friend, and the world. It is a brave step to recognise that we each have something within us that is a gift for which our world longs. This verse explores that affirmation in a way that hopefully makes space for us to become curious about that which lies within that indeed makes us a precious blessing.

There are many ways we endeavour to understand success and what a ‘win’ looks like. Often the metric or gauge seems to celebrate characteristics that seem unattainable or attainable only by those with access to privileges that are inaccessible to most. It has been my experience, however, that if we can let go of that particular story, what success looks like is usually directly connected to our tenacity to keep at it, even in the face of those who ‘no’ our aspirations and commitment to being change.