Read an Excerpt
SIMPLE GIFTS
By Judy Brown
Trafford Publishing
Copyright © 2011 Judy Brown
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4669-0392-0
Chapter One
Little Bits from Jottings
Perfection
Perfection
Fails us,
Breaks down,
Eventually,
Disintegrates.
It's being human
That can save us.
No seed grows
No seed grows
Except by
Breaking through
Its own
Protective coat.
It is the small space
It is the small space
In our lives,
The daily corner
To which we need repair,
That can create a
Whole new world.
For us,
Vast,
Unconstrained,
And opening.
Because you have no money
Because you have no money
Don't believe
That you must squander
What you have
In such abundance:
Time together,
Joy,
Attention,
Challenge,
Your good work.
Everybody Counts
Everybody counts.
When the spider
Weaves the web
No connecting point
Is missed.
If you are missing
From our midst
We are the lesser
For that loss,
And incomplete.
To sit simply
To sit
Simply
For one sweet hour
And notice
All that is
Unfolding
In the
Light of day—
That is
A fine, fine
Thing.
Each day dawns
Each day dawns
With its own
Discoveries and surprises,
With its gifts.
If we are home
To all of that
We can't be lost.
A reservoir within
Each of us needs
A reservoir within,
Because life doesn't happen
On an average.
It has its hurricanes
And droughts,
And lovely days.
So also joy.
So also deep despair.
I wonder
I wonder
What this day
Will bring
In its unfolding.
Now it begins,
For me,
Like the
Unwrapping
Of an
Unexpected
Gift.
The Beauty of the Broken
The beauty
Of the broken
And irregular
Is clear
With seashells—
Why not so
With one another?
Difficult
If it is difficult
Try something
Different.
A tiny shift
Might find
The easy
Natural path,
The one
That's meant
To be.
Persistence
And insistence
May be
Good things —
But not always.
Spring
Spring
Creeps northward
On her
Annual pilgrimage
Home,
Slowly
Opening blooms
And teaching
Birds to sing.
Promise
I heard
A bird
Sing
Before dawn—
The gentle
Promise
Of a spring
That's soon
To come.
Miracle
That the white flower
Has managed
To find light and life,
Making its way
Between the heavy
Patio stones,
Seems such
A miracle
To me,
And even more,
It blooms there,
Planted in such
Seeming solid stone.
It blooms.
Courage
Certain of the vines
Reach out,
Sending their tendrils
Out and out,
Toward the air,
The sky,
Away from
Anything to
Cling to.
Such vegetative
Courage.
Mystery
A poem
Should
End
Early,
With the
Mystery
Still intact,
A question
Yet
Unanswered.
Downpour
The rain
Abates a bit,
Like a mourner
Taking a
Momentary breath,
And then
The downpour
Begins again,
Like a
Great wail
Of water.
Seasons
There are seasons
Where you
Take in
What you must—
And only later
When the season
Comes
For clearing,
And every Friday
Seven bins of trash
Are sitting at the curb,
(Hauled out as with a
gardener's joy
that finally the thatch
is cleared away),
Only on such a morning
Can we admit
The weight
Of always having taken in
All that we must.
Surprise
Inevitable,
Yet unpredictable—
So much of life
Is thus:
A hurricane,
The summer's
Heat lightening,
Mortality
And joy.
All take us
By surprise—
Itself surprising.
Logs
At the heart
Of the fire
Is one
Of the last logs
From the old apple tree
I climbed
Fifty years ago.
Last year it
Simply fell down.
Old, dry
Irregular,
Half-hollowed out,
It burns
Hot
And with ease.
Tapestry
The memories
Of joys
Sustain us
Through the
Precipice of sorrow
And despair.
It is knowing
The tapestry of life
Is whole
That is life's
Secret.
Winter
Cold grey
December day
Stares back
At me,
Unblinking.
Sometimes
Winter never
Seems to
Close its eyes.
Lean Years
Those years—
Those lean years—
Brought the lessons
And awarenesses
I had to have
To find my way
Back home.
Autumn
Another
Glowing day
Appears.
Another
Autumn glory
Dawns
And spreads its joy
Across the heart.
Those men
Who sing
The praise
Of spring
Have not lived long enough
To know this fall.
Transition
This is a day
Of transition
To be savoured,
A bridge
Between what is
Now past,
And that to come,
Unknown.
Luminous,
The day rises
To meet us.
Leaf
Floating
As it was,
Zig-zag and yellow,
I couldn't tell
If it was
A butterfly
Newly born
Or a leaf
Newly dying.
Grieving
We are softened
By our grievings—
Avoidable and unavoidable
Losses that appear to us
Like apparitions—
Speaking to us
In a language
That we recognize
As if it were
Our native tongue.
However many years
We have,
We have.
Then life
Begins
Another
Round,
A round,
The voices
Ours,
Or others,
Never mind,
The song
Goes on.
Turning Point
She had spent
Most of life
Anxious and agonizing—
Unnecessarily,
As it turned out.
She even sensed
It at the time—
The senseless
Waste of all
That energy.
So she decided
She would stop.
And did.
That was
The turning point.
Maturity
With maturity
Comes the understanding
That what
Cannot be changed
Must be endured,
Or transformed
Into a mysterious
Adventure.
Waves
The purple froth
Of the wave edge
Is traced
Upon the salmon sand
At sunset,
And then recedes
To slide gently
Beneath
The next wave
That arrives
To leave
Its whispered mark
Upon the
Ever darkening sand.
Pelican
The great grey
Pelican
Heads home
At dusk,
Floating
Without an effort
On the currents
Overhead,
Turning a bit
To catch
One wave of air,
Adjusting,
Sailing,
Flying fast
Without a single
Move of wings,
Just floating
Home.
Magic
The sun
Which frosted
Everything—
The air,
The sky,
The clouds—
A soft sweet pink,
Has disappeared
Behind the clouds.
But for a moment
Magic had descended
With the dawn.
I stood out
On the lawn
And breathed
The pink air in
As if I were
A child,
Enchanted.
Heart
If I listened
To my heart
I'd know
That it's
Been beating
Just like this
And all along.
Human
This is
A human
Business,
Being human.
What's
To be
Done?
Spirit
The native woman
Spoke with tears of anguish
How the Westerners
Think you can own a place:
"How can you own
Something with spirit?"
She had asked us,
Brokenly. Then later
She had said "The spirit
Of a place hold us,
We don't own it."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from SIMPLE GIFTS by Judy Brown Copyright © 2011 by Judy Brown. Excerpted by permission of Trafford Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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