Friday, April 26, 2013

Let Beauty Now Be What We Do




Here is a soulful song that also goes perfectly with my blog yesterday: 

Let Beauty Now Be






This song, by the Illumination Band, has deeply companioned me this month.  The sound is blues-y, folkish, bluegrass-y music that uses Rumi poetry in the lyrics.  What an awesome blend of heart, wisdom, poetry, and sound!













Let Beauty Now Be

Some mornings we wake up on empty,
to a day that's got nothing but need.
So we reach for a strong cup of coffee,
or maybe a good book to read.

The words of the gospels upholdin
but they come from so high and so far.
But, sometimes in trouble the best thing to do
is pick up the good old guitar.

Let the beauty we love come and fill us.
Let the beauty around get us through.
Let the beauty inside be our compass
Let beauty now be what we do.
                               
Cause all hearts still long for the beauty.
It's a secret that's here every where.
And the soft, sweet old tune
can remind us it shines
In the midst of the deepest despair.

There are hundreds of ways joy can find us.
Like the hundreds of ways children play.
And there's hundreds of ways
to kneel down on the ground,
hundreds of ways we can pray.

Let the beauty we love come and fill us.
Let the beauty around get us through.
Let the beauty inside be our compass
Let beauty now be what we do.



Find the song on mp3 downloads on Amazon and CD Baby.   ENJOY!!!  

Love the description CD Baby says this about the band:
The Illumination Band creates a unique musical experience by drawing on the words of the great13th c. Sufi poet Rumi. With soaring vocal harmonies, lilting old-time melodies and hard-driving blues giving way to moments of mystical longing, the Illumination Band blurs the lines between musical genres as seamlessly as it crosses cultural boundaries. Grounded in American bluegrass, gospel and country, an Illumination Band concert covers a lot of emotional territory but always returns to the heart’s yearning for transcendence.

Illumination Band is now on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Illumination-Band/190803891021832

Joyfully,
Sharon

Thursday, April 25, 2013

Look for Beauty

 
 
Beauty shows up in odd places.  
Like splashes of color on gray pavement, a stunning smile coaxed from the shy heart.  Beauty, though exploited by advertisers, is often found fresh and free - crescent moons etched on glass, musical laughter, photos of mountain and sunset on bookmarks, loving emails tucked in folds of computers, paint stroked on canvas, seeds showered on the ground.
 
When sorrow overwhelms, I look for beauty. 
 
With all that is broken in this world, with all the violence that is real and then sensationalized, pain is easy to find. Sorrow and violence fills the screens of our eyes and ears, even resides in the shadows
of our unconscious. 

Compassion and goodness exist there too. Beauty can be found within and without; what fills us depends on what we look for, what qualities grow in us depend on that which we seek, 
tend
             and feed.
   
Last weekend, as the nation mourned lives lost in Boston, I wandered down a tree-lined lane, looking for beauty, needing beauty.  My eyes were drawn to hundreds of tiny lacy bouquets of lime and yellow on the path ahead.  Casually scattered, gathered with a dot of red, vivid bundles of seed and flower lay in sharp contrast to their bleak backdrop of macadam. How simple; how exquisite!
 
 
 
               As I continued walking, I came upon a statue. One arm severed, bleeding. The other reaching out to comfort a child.  

                                          

People break and bleed. The earth breaks and bleeds.  Even most religions speak of a God who breaks and bleeds. When anguished, I find hope and courage knowing violence is not the end of the story. God reminds me visually: joy and beauty are present even in the midst of suffering.  Perhaps my meloncholy eyes are first caught by the bleeding, but the image that endures is the tender hand caressing the child. Wether you are one who looks at tragedy or one who must look away, in the end
it is love that unites us. 
Might does little, but Love heals and strengthens.   
 
 
 
 
The earth sings with beauty.....
 


                                                 always!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Even as she bleeds, weeps.
 
 
 
If you and I cultivate the ability to see with the eyes of our souls, then we will become exactly what we want to the world to be.  We will be
                             the artist,
                                    the lover,
                                           the see-er,
                                                 the gentling,
                                this broken world craves. 
 
 
 


Seek truth and goodness. And when you find beauty on this 
                sweet earth ......                   

 
...share it, and add more!
 
 
 
Joyfully,
Sharon

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

restore




                                    

        ~  R    E    S   T    O    R    E  ~

                          
              
                              In January, I chose this word for 2013.

                                      
                                          I chose it for myself. 
                                   I hold it for others.
                                           I pray it for the world.



     I planned to write a blog post about remembering my promise to foster two more dogs in honor of the slain Newtown teacher and child who loved dogs: Rachel Davino and Catherine Hubbbard.  Hemi and Hoss are in their new homes; they were raised with love and sent forward with love, thus fullfilling my promise. I planned a happy post..... 

And then Boston exploded. I find myself at a loss for words.  

                               So, I simply offer my one word:   RESTORE  


Spirit of God, of all that is Love,
Restore us....

Sharon