POEMS

St. Francis (My Hero)

Lord,
Make me an instrument of your Peace;
Where there is Hatred let me sow Love;
Where there is Injury, Pardon
Where there is Doubt, Faith
Where there is Despair, Hope;
Where there is Darkness, Light
Where there is Sadness, Joy.

O Divine Master

Grant that I may not so much 
Seek to be Consoled as to Console;
To be Understood as to Understand;
To be Loved as to Love.

For it is in Giving that we Receive.
It is in Pardoning that we are Pardoned.
It is in Dying that we are Born to Eternal Life.
St.  Francis of Assisi
             ***




Hatred never ceases by hatred.
But by love alone is healed.
This is an ancient and eternal law.
From  "A Path with Heart"
by Jack Cornfield
        ***

Words do not express thoughts very well; 
everything immediately becomes a little different 
a little distorted, a little foolish.  
And yet it also pleases me and seems right 
that what is of value and wisdom to one man 
seems nonsense to another.
"Siddhartha"
by Herman Hesse
       ***

If you want to shrink something you must first allow it to expand.
If you want to get rid of something you must first allow it to flourish.
If you want to take something, you must first allow it to be given.
This is called the subtle perception of the way things are.
The soft overcomes the hard.
The slow overcomes the fast.
Let your working remain a mystery.
Just show people the results.
"Growing Myself "
by Judith Handelman
        ***

Water is flexible and has no resistance.  
It flows everywhere.
"Tao-te Ching"
         ***

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart 
and..try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms
and like books that are written in a very foreign toungue.  
Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you
because you would not be able to live them.  
And the point is, to live everything.  Live the questions now.
Perhaps you will then gradually,  without noticing it, 
live along some distant day into the answer.
"Letters to a Young Poet"
by Ranier Maria Rilke
          ***

He who travels far will often see things
Far removed from what he believed was Truth.
When he talks about it in the fields at home,
He is often accused of lying,
For the obdurate people will not believe
What they do not see and distinctly feel.
Inexperience, I believe,
Will give little credence to my song.
"Journey to the East"
by Herman Hesse
       ***

Human beings are born soft and supple.
At their death they are stiff and hard.
The grasses and the trees are born tender and pliant.
At their death they are withered and dry.

Therefore the stiff and inflexible 
is a disciple of death.
The gentle and yielding
is a disciple of life.

An army that is inflexible never wins a battle.
A tree that is unbending easily snaps.

The hard and rigid will be broken.
The supple and yielding will prevail.
"Tao Te Ching"
 by Lao Tzu
     ***

All but blind
In his chambered hole
Gropes for worms
The four-clawed Mole.

All but blind
In the evening sky,
The hooded Bat
Twirls softly by.

All but blind 
In the burning day
The Barn-Owl blunders
On her way.

And blind as are
These three to me
So, blind to Someone
I must be.
"All but Blind"
by Walter De La Mare
         ***

I exist as I am, that is enough.
If no other in the world be aware I sit content,
And if each and all be aware I sit content.

One world is aware, and by far the largest to me,
and that is myself.
And whether I come to my own today
 or in ten thousand or ten million years, 
I can cheerfully take it now, 
or with equal cheerfulness, I can wait.
"Leaves of Grass"
by Walt Whitman
        ***

I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I an the gentle autumn rain.
Do not stand at my grave and cry.
I am not there.  I did not die.
From The Sacred Journey of the Peaceful Warrior
By Dan Hillman
           ***

Rainbow Bridge

The animals are happy and content, except for one small thing: The miss someone very special to them, someone who had to be left behind.

They spend their time in play together, but the day finally comes when one animal suddenly stops and looks into the distance. the bright eyes are intent; the eager body quivers. Suddenly he or she begins to break away from the group, almost flying over the green grass. Four legs carry him faster and faster. YOU have been spotted, and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in a joyous reunion, never again to be parted from each other. the happy kisses rain damply on your face, your hands caress again the beloved head and body, and you look once more into never for one day absent from your heart.

Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together.

(Found on the Internet, Author Unknown)