Sunday, June 30, 2013

:: gentle, gentle

{via pinterest}
 we are not gentle people. we have very heavy feet, and so often, they find their way to treading heedlessly on the dreams of others.

dreams are gentle things. they are big things, even if their keepers have no idea just how wide their wings might spread. they are delicate things, easily broken if they are not given care. it doesn't take much for careless fiddling to pluck each feather from its place and leave them a pile. and then the dreamer must rebuild, if they ever dare again.

there is sweetness deep inside, a kind of fruit worth savouring but so easy to bruise and destroy if we press too hard. and we are not gentle people.

:: but i want to be. 

i've started to focus on my mouth recently. the way my lips form words, the way they open when i inhale. what comes out with the breath, i wonder?

is it Light, radiant and luminescent, whispering Life into each soul that i encounter. or is it too late because my fingers caught the flame and pinched it dark?

because the seekers are met with sideways glances and the wrestling ones are given a wider berth, and the lonely hearts echo like windchimes in a wasteland, an empty beauty that everyone else is missing. and the whispers come, how dare they? they should know better. 


what you held in your hand, 
{photo property of dramaticelegance}
what you counted and carefully saved, 
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness. 
{Naomi Shihab Nye}


and i can't help but look at them and quietly weep because i've been there, just where they are. and maybe i still am, a little bit, because my footing is learning these mountain heights, where the other does leap like grace and i'm still white-knuckled. but i look to my left and to my right and see others there. beautiful ones with half-plucked wings wrapped in linen and eyes so full of soul that it takes my breath away.

this is my tribe, my Love-sisters. and we've made a circle of shoes on the ground where we all sit together, this holy sacred place that hums with hints of Lion's song still so alive in the earth. and we plant our seeds, one beside the other, and watch them lift their boughs to the sky and murmur, He-Who-Sees is here. 

and we hold hands and hum familiar notes that shimmer in the new-breathed air from a Lion's mouth, the place where we have all found ourselves. there is water there, for we are deep-living mermaids with transforming souls. there is fire there, soft and warm to comfort shivering souls. and softly, together, we seek His face.

and we are holding hands and whispering together

gentle, gentle 
:: we are brave

8 comments:

  1. So wonderful words! Reaches into the deep of my soul.

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  2. lonely hearts echo like windchimes in a wasteland, an empty beauty that everyone else is missing...ha...love those poetic words...and i like too that circle of friends there in the end...we all need that community...mermaids w/ transforming souls...smiles.

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  3. Oh Lord, help me to be - - - gentle !!

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  4. Dear Rachael
    This is one thing the enemy of our souls like to steal the moment a little seed is growing in our heart: gentleness! I think that is why it is a fruit of the Spitit and not a fruit of ourselves for we just cannot have a consistent gentle heart if we are left on our own.
    Blessings
    Mia

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  5. These words really speak to me:

    "what comes out with the breath, i wonder?

    is it Light, radiant and luminescent, whispering Life into each soul that i encounter. or is it too late because my fingers caught the flame and pinched it dark?"

    I've been hearing such hateful words of late from the mouths of Christians, maybe even meant in the name of "love" but they sure don't sound loving. :-( I want what comes out of my breath to whisper life. I know I fail way too often, but that's my desire anyway. Thanks for this, Rachel.

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  6. Focusing my mouth ... good idea.

    Fondly,
    Glenda

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  7. this is so beautiful, Rachel. Just.

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I look at you and see all the ways a soul can bruise, and I wish I could sink my hands into your flesh and light lanterns along your spine so you know there's nothing but light when I see you. :: Shinji Moon