hope

Waiting (Friday’s Free for All)

/ Janna Hill / Leave a comment

For hopes that hung on a chicken bones

For hearts that lived in chains


For pods of green that died unknown

While waiting for the rain


For dreams left bare on empty prayer

For souls that wished in vain


For tears unshared in mute despair

While waiting for a change

For you and I and all mankind

For worlds where peace was slain

For faith and mind no man can bind

We wait and wait again.

Remember, it’s National Poetry Month. Get out there & enjoy the journey.

Poem from Getting me Back (The Voices Within)

A Pilgrims Prayer (Revisited)

/ Janna Hill / 2 Comments

Another November is nearly at end and another Thanksgiving is upon us.

And, another revisiting of A Pilgrims Prayer. (Slightly revised from previous version)

A Pilgrim’s Prayer

Once upon a time a long, a long time ago (before Black Friday) Thanksgiving was a celebration of harvest and a time to give thanks.

Those early pilgrims did not have the conveniences we enjoy today, yet somehow they survived.

I didn’t really know any of those pilgrims but I did see a John Wayne movie once. John knew a pilgrim when he saw one. He seemed to know a lot of pilgrims but that was a long time ago too.

I propose we are all pilgrims, each one of us on a journey of sorts; our own personal pilgrimage, if you will.

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We are all looking for something. Be it a quest for self-confirmation, truth, a cure, enrichment, enlightenment, comfort, a friend, a lover, a job, a meal, or a place to lay our weary head at the end of another day.

I believe life is a journey, or at least it should be. It would be terrible to think we were just flailing through this experience, killing time on this giant floating gumball, while waiting for the next Black Friday specials.

I believe we all have one destination, though we travel many different roads and I trust that we have choices.

Hopefully we will choose well. On the occasion we take a wrong turn [and we will] I pray we have enough sense and humility to stop and seek direction, to reassess our route and to be considerate in our voyage.

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So here’s wishing all of you pilgrims a Happy Thanksgiving and may we all, whatever road we’re on, take time to look ahead, pause, and meditate on the many things we have to be grateful for, put aside our grievances and give thanks.

My personal prayer:

I pray our good seeds of hope, humility, toil and courage produce abundantly; that love and kindness grow wild like the weeds of early spring – fruitful and undeterred. And your harvest be rich with wisdom and discernment.

 

Waiting

/ Janna Hill / 5 Comments

I honestly didn’t know who this man was (I’m sheltered like that) until Sara’s post exposed him here on WordPress. No, I do not live in a cave though I have often wished I did.

The thing that moved me other than his world renown photography is that Steve McCurry’s Simple Act of Waiting  told in pictures is [chillingly] what I imagined when I wrote Waiting. I seriously got goosebumps.

If you’re like me (sheltered and horrible with names) or you are lucky enough to live in a cave, that doesn’t matter – I know you will recognize his photos when you see them. Who could forget the eyes of the Afghan girl starring out from the cover of National Geographic? Who would want to?

Waiting

For hopes that hung on a chicken bones
For hearts that lived in chains
For pods of green that died unknown
While waiting for the rain

For dreams left bare on empty prayer
For souls that wished in vain
For tears unshared in mute despair
While waiting for a change

For you and I and all mankind
For worlds where peace was slain
For faith and mind no man can bind
We wait and wait again

Poem first published in Interior Verse © 2012. Republished 2018 in Getting Me Back

Weekly Photo Challenge (Inside)

/ Janna Hill / 7 Comments

For this weeks photo challenge I went immediately to an old jewelry box and looked inside.  I recall rummaging through my grandmothers costume jewelry like a pirate with precious booty.

Inside the Jewelry Box

Mine is filled with trinkets of cheap metals,  faux pearls and inexpensive stones but they are treasures to me and every piece holds a dear memory of the bestower.  This weeks theme also inspired me to share a prose from Interior Verse (which is free via kindle right now) titled The Chest of Hope.

 

The Chest of Hope

The Chest of Hope

It’s just a small brown wicker basket not built to hold much and a bit tattered from over handling.

Its beautiful warm browns have dulled and faded with age on the outside but inside the natural luster still shines. Its top is held in place by make do leather ties because the first woody hasps were worn in two and now dangle loosely without purpose.

What hands made the airy coffer?  I wonder as I stroke the thin smooth fibers.

Was it one as handsome as the tight weaves frayed by time?

Though dust has long since claimed his finger prints-

I know that he was a weaver; I imagine that he was a dream weaver…

Diligently intertwining each cane thread with my hopes in mind…

A place to store my breathing dreams so that they could be kept safe and close at hand, amassed in a beautiful fibrous reminder.

A quaint little chest of hope I will one day hand down to a child, a grand child or perhaps even a great grand child when I have used up its contents.

When I have taken the dusty lid off one last time and felt deep into the corners to make certain I haven’t left any ideas untouched.

I imagine when I offer it up to him or her they will look at me like I’m crazy (and I may well be) then they’ll tear the lid off expecting to find a treasure of sorts before saying with disappointment, “It’s just an empty old basket.” It is then I will share with them the wishes and ideas that were stored and later born of that basket. How they were kept safe till I could see them come to fruition. And one more time I will imagine the handsome dark skinned man who meticulously weaved the wonderful piece…a place to store my dreams because dreams need room to breathe.

Then I will show them how to place their own aspirations into the old auburn chest with caution to keep them safe, to nurture their hopes and give them time to mature.

And if my last wish were to come true I will see them realize the birth of their visions.