Art from Souls

"Spirit" - Carol McCarthy
 
What makes us happy?  Probably being seen for who we are. Who are you?  Your body? Your job?  Your clothes, your house, your car?  Spirit?  Everyone is spirit.  You don't have one, you ARE one.  Aspects of God:  Beauty, generosity, patience, intelligence, warmth, humor, speaking the truth in Love.

The other side of the coin represents separation from God.
Jealousy, ignorance, violence, impatience, judgement.  The engine that drives us is Love - that aspect of God in each one of us, coming through us to each other.

Say hello.  Quietly to yourself.  Quietly to God.  Do you hear that small voice responding? 
Take time to notice, to listen.  He is showing us his compassion and understanding. For when we're asleep/unconscious to Love, God wakes us up to his Presence.  ~Carol

 "Clarity" - Colleen Penquite

My most compassionate self, with all of my not-so-compassionate judgements, chooses today to keep all of my opinions to my self, to keep my mouth shut. I ask God to help me, just for today. I have struggled all week. What do I want,  what is making ME crazy! In a moment of clarity (by Gods Grace), I see.
I make me crazy. When I sit in me, that's all I see. When I can look to You, and ask You what I can do, how can I help YOU, then and only then do I move from all of my self- ish - ness! Whew! A tip. A blog to write, really helps. Peace!

 "One Today"- Richard Blanco
 
One sun rose on us today, kindled over our shores, peeking over the Smokies, greeting the faces of the Great Lakes, spreading a simple truth across the Great Plains, then charging across the Rockies. One light, waking up rooftops, under each one, a story told by our silent gestures moving behind windows.
My face, your face, millions of faces in morning's mirrors, each one yawning to life, crescendoing into our day: pencil-yellow school buses, the rhythm of traffic lights, fruit stands: apples, limes, and oranges arrayed like rainbows
begging our praise. Silver trucks heavy with oil or paper—
bricks or milk, teeming over highways alongside us,
on our way to clean tables, read ledgers, or save lives—
to teach geometry, or ring-up groceries as my mother did
for twenty years, so I could write this poem.
All of us as vital as the one light we move through,
the same light on blackboards with lessons for the day:
equations to solve, history to question, or atoms imagined,
the "I have a dream" we keep dreaming,
or the impossible vocabulary of sorrow that won't explain
the empty desks of twenty children marked absent
today, and forever. Many prayers, but one light
breathing color into stained glass windows,
life into the faces of bronze statues, warmth
onto the steps of our museums and park benches
as mothers watch children slide into the day.

One ground. Our ground, rooting us to every stalk
of corn, every head of wheat sown by sweat
and hands, hands gleaning coal or planting windmills
in deserts and hilltops that keep us warm, hands
digging trenches, routing pipes and cables, hands
as worn as my father's cutting sugarcane
so my brother and I could have books and shoes.
The dust of farms and deserts, cities and plains
mingled by one wind—our breath. Breathe. Hear it
through the day's gorgeous din of honking cabs,
buses launching down avenues, the symphony
of footsteps, guitars, and screeching subways,
the unexpected song bird on your clothes line.
Hear: squeaky playground swings, trains whistling,
or whispers across café tables, Hear: the doors we open
for each other all day, saying: hello, shalom,
buon giorno, howdy, namaste, or buenos días
in the language my mother taught me—in every language
spoken into one wind carrying our lives
without prejudice, as these words break from my lips.
One sky: since the Appalachians and Sierras claimed
their majesty, and the Mississippi and Colorado worked
their way to the sea. Thank the work of our hands:
weaving steel into bridges, finishing one more report
for the boss on time, stitching another wound
or uniform, the first brush stroke on a portrait,
or the last floor on the Freedom Tower
jutting into a sky that yields to our resilience.
One sky, toward which we sometimes lift our eyes
tired from work: some days guessing at the weather
of our lives, some days giving thanks for a love
that loves you back, sometimes praising a mother
who knew how to give, or forgiving a father
who couldn't give what you wanted.
We head home: through the gloss of rain or weight
of snow, or the plum blush of dusk, but always—home,
always under one sky, our sky. And always one moon
like a silent drum tapping on every rooftop
and every window, of one country—all of us—
facing the stars
hope—a new constellation
waiting for us to map it,
waiting for us to name it—together.

  [Note: This poem by Richard Blanco touched me so deeply, as spoken at the Presidential Inauguration. It brings the largest version of community together! What a gift, this poem.]