Voice of a Star

Voice of a Star- Zayra Yves

Out of the flame
and into the street

runs the child of everything,
naked with grief
and nothing to hide.

She is fueled by a selfless light
where only the heart
is a guide,
follow her.



(painting by zayra yves - all rights reserved)

Let go of the small idea you hold of yourself and others...

"Our worst fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?"


Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God; your playing small doesn't serve the world."

That quote by Marianne Williamson might be one of the most popular quotes I have heard people verbally speak, as often as it is quoted in print.


It came to mind this morning how often I have been caught in the trap of smallness both by my own proclivities and by those of others. If you have that habit of agreeing with someone's idea of you which keeps you from feeling joy or traps you into a small place of story, or if you find yourself being a miser who is holding someone else in a very tight place, then maybe today you can let those stories grow a few inches taller...let some joy and forgiveness into the center of it.

Another author and inspirational speaker, David Whyte, has a terrific poem on this same subject of not shrinking, "Sweet Darkness." Recently I attended an event at the Mount Madonna center where I had an opportunity to listen to him recite the poem. And, I was reminded that we are all greater than the illusions we create to cause ourselves and one another pain.

Sweet Darkness- by David Whyte

When your eyes are tired
the world is tired also.

When your vision has gone
no part of the world can find you.

Time to go into the dark
where the night has eyes
to recognize its own.

There you can be sure
you are not beyond love.

The dark will be your womb
tonight.

The night will give you a horizon
further than you can see.

You must learn one thing:
the world was made to be free in.

Give up all the other worlds
except the one to which you belong.

Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn

anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive

is too small for you.


_

There are sad moments when humans want to be stuck in the small petty stories they tell themselves and others but what is to be gained from that?


Let your love blossom into having enough heart to heal the pain, embrace the taller version of your soul while you elevate the greatest parts of those you love. It can be done.

Destiny, Fate and Soul

No matter what is written about destiny, we cannot be certain as to where it comes from or how its dramatic fate truly plays out its passion in our lives. What I see is that everyone eventually has a moment to be more than their story (as the story is often a limited vision of ourselves passed to us by family or society) which is when destiny appears to meet up with our hard work to create a measure of glory.

The other opportunity for destiny to arrive is when we step outside of our small notions about ourselves to rise up with forgiveness and gestures that show how much we truly value our journey and each other.

Whatever the case may be, destiny, like fate, and many of our spiritual and emotional experiences, has an aura of mystery about it. Perhaps we are not supposed to know for sure the answer to where destiny arrives from, so much as we are meant to make ourselves fertile ground by clearing away the "stuff" that stifles us. This is where the practice of detachment is helpful, especially when there is a lot of negative influence or undo drama being created by the planet of humans (assuming that most of us are just regular human beings, regardless of our awards or talents, and not saints), as it allows for some distance on the web of nonsense.

No one can take away your destiny or journey. We each have our own path to walk where each relationship we encounter is unique. By the same token, no one can remove your long hours of work, effort and constant attention to the details of your soul. The soul has its own way of taking your breath away.

People Cannot Claim People

Only things can be possessed; beings cannot be possessed.
You can have a communion with a being.
You can share your love, your poetry, your beauty, your body, your mind.
You can share but you cannot do business.
You cannot bargain.
You cannot possess a man or a woman.
But everybody is trying to do that all over the earth.

- Osho

And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, "Speak to us of Children."


And he said:
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,

which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,

and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.

Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;

The Prophet - Kahlil Gibran

-

Image: drawing by Kahlil Gibran

Eternal Light

An African Legend: White Lions & Leopards

1st Prize:
Faded Hieroglyphs by Zayra Yves




"This poem is a surreal and exceptionally powerful poem that explores tribal and ancestral belief systems, and highlights the respect and awe that lions once had. Congratulations Zayra, for this and the other poems you entered they were all wonderful to read." Michelle Stewart & Judges



_


Faded Hieroglyphs

There are eternal images somewhere I have been in my dreams.
I long to return to the sands where lions roam,
sit as sun statues, and roar in the night winds.

I have heard them singing of golden rings,
of fire in my belly, while ashes and petals
blew in the alleys with yesterday's news.

Red with ceremony was the light
and women's bodies did not harden
as they stood in the shadows
watching the winos commune with jackals
and the children play with paper sails.

Among the kohl eyes and black draped women
shopping in the bizarre,

I long to wander free as a winged creature
in the shape of a hieroglyph,
in the shape of mystery, in the curve of linen…

I long to see the women in the streets
who speak to me from their eyes;
hear them as they say:

Welcome home my sister, my brother.

I feel their presence now and know that we are one.

If this life is fragile and we are often too easily broken,
then let today be the day we celebrate love, so beautifully transparent
with its perfumes and melancholy vines.

Come me with where the lions roam free
and give over your weary heart to rest in mine.

I long to be once again in ancient sands, in pristine gardens,
in God's country listening to the wild things speak.

Let us be where the journey is loving,
where the tribesmen know secrets we have forgotten.

Come with me now where the white lions are walking.
I have heard them calling your name.


_

If you want to hear Faded Hieroglyphs, you may go to my web page and click on the ReverbNation link or you may go to Crowned Compassion on CD Baby and purchase it directly.I would also like to add that three of my poems are published in this magnificent collection! It is just stunning. I feel so honored to be there with the writers, artists and photographers!!!!

Amazing!!!!

www.whitelions.org
(photo is from Linda Tucker's book cover: Mystery of the White Lions

www.zayrayves.com

book is published here:

http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/detail/1963069

My Favorite of Shad's lyrics from 'Keep Shining'....

One of my younger sister's sent this message to me today and she really made my day. I listened to the lyrics several times and I was so impressed with these two stanza's that I felt compelled to share them because the words are so positive in a world kind of nuts with being petty. I also was deeply touched by my sister's gesture.

It's a message not to give up...no matter.


Here are some of the best lyrics from Shad's
"Keep Shining"

-

Nothin’s for certain, we all have to trust
Someone
I used to want to find the love of my life
Now I’m tryin’ to live a life of love
It’s not just a husband and wife thing
It’s something that Christ brings
True beauty doesn’t run from the light
Keep shining

-

t’s funny how words like, ‘consciousness’ and ‘positive music’
Can somehow start to feel hollow, it’s
Become synonymous with polishing soft collagen lips
On the face of race politics
Well you can’t be everything to everyone
So let me be anything to anyone
The world turns and there’s clouds sometimes
But there’s no such thing as a setting sun
It always keeps shining

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