Dancing – Movement of the Heart (Day 5)

October 5, 2012 ~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 9 Comments

Dancing is a vertical expression of a horizontal desire.

Robert Frost

Dance – Movement of the Heart

Elizabeth W. Marshall

If only all would dance. Simply, a little more.
As shadows, sun’s rays, and white foam waves,
Their rhythmic breaking in and on the shore.
What a gentle teacher ocean is.
Of how to find your rhythm, how to learn to dance.
Water, foam and wave thrust on shelly sand.
The dance of wave on wave, eyes Beauty from the shore.

And we think far too often to save it for the feasts.
For man to do a pas de deux when woman dresses up for out.
But what of the dance of the everyday, the simple celebrations.
Of life and living, joy in the daily, movement becomes art.
And what of running fingers down the page, and letting words join in.
The dance of wordplay, phrase finds rhythm on the page,
Partners up with thought and steps from line to line, a dance.

What if words would partner with the heart, to do a dance of lyrical along
The lines of prose, does it become poetic and more a jig with steps more
Light and gay, where space is left so eyes can linger, breathing soft and slow.
Creates a space for eyes and hearts to partner up with mind, and waltz and
Sway, no need to rush, the pace is slow, the soul can take her time.
The pace of living can slow and savor, seeking steps which linger,
Long and longer, sweet and merry, hurry left behind.

And do we long to dance, because so early on we did, swayed and rocked as babies
The motion taught so young, to drift and sway and rock and sing, why leave that
Back in childhood. Can’t every movement restore Dance, isn’t life worth dancing truly?
Find steps light and graceful, feasting on the now, with song, and grateful pairing up
As happy partners, loving life and dancing in the moment.
Learning from trees their limbs sway, the tails of dog, like metronome have rhythm.
If only all would simply dance, a little more when living.

(Thank you for joining me on this 31 Days – A Series of Words. This is the Part 5 in the series. Other posts have included Ordinary, Savor, Hope, and The Poetic if you would like to back travel and read. Grateful to have you journeying with this pilgrim.) Note, in crediting Robert Frost’s quote on dance and my subsequent piece, I have placed my name beside my writing. Please know this is for clarification simply and that I highly esteem Robert Frost’s work and feel humbled to even be on the same page. This was to give credit, no form of comparison. Please note this, and extend grace for any wrong association or comparison which was never intended. Thanks, for grace. –Elizabeth.

The Poetic – Day 4 (Part 2)

October 4, 2012October 4, 2012 ~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 4 Comments

A Plea For The Case Of Poetry

She steps into a world of books, there may be millions there.

Passes under the bold B and the bold N.

The smell of coffee hangs heavy in the air. Pungent dark soil acid rich. Trademark of the brand.

And then her heart begins to race, or rather did it slow. At the sight of the section marked, not prose.

So small, as if a slight. So hidden, as if from shame. So narrow, as if to be a step away from invisible.

It, the section marked Poetry.

And there she learned what others knew, that there would always be just these few.

The precious jewels, ones penned by Oliver, Colllins, Frost and such.

That shelves and rows, long deep and wide would not be needed to house the ones that bind the words of Poet.

Oh there were many in the store. Plenty for the masses.

But the heart goes looking for the ones that don’t take 367 pages to tell the story.

With plots that twist and turn and round the bend, a trail of 95 charachters, all ripe and developed richly.

There is death and drama, suspense and gore, the author delights, you’ve been strung along.

With storylines and subplot and subsubplots thick with trails and tales, long and winding, longwinded, long

suffering. The epic. With perfect punctuation.

Prose, the never ending we are almost there, the author woos you in.

The end is not as you had dreamed, no joy in a poet’s brief and pithy telling.

But now she goes the way of those and wanders off verbosely.

And like the poet in the corner simply lost in thought,

she lost her way to build her case for more bookcases

at the neighborhood Barnes and Noble.

Joining joyfully with Emily for Imperfect Prose

The Poetic, Day 4 (Part 1)

October 4, 2012October 4, 2012 ~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 9 Comments

Its a challenge,

issued from me to me

let’s not see what Webster says,

we dare not look to a boxed, canned definition of this of all things, though many do and that’s fine too,

it is the first cousin of freedom,

that’s enough for now,

no,

we’ll open the window to the soul and listen for how the heart defines it, what it says

how it shapes,

with blood, and those pulsing veins, with bone and marrow tacked on too

and flesh, the skin, the cover

the words, they walk out like happy preschool

little ones at recess filled with pregnant wonder of running free

oh how they will run when the heavy school door opens and out they go.

the words, they wait on you,

come play, and bring your finest whimsy with you,

come dance, bring your dancing shoes,

we will breathe and I will wait

I will wait and we will pause

period

And understanding, heart and mind

and art , they will collide

down the playground slide

one atop another

into a heap of joy- squeeling, happy, word joy

they land, so soft.

And at the bottom

they are there

the words.

pick them up, dust them off,

and glean the poetic from the pile,

of words.

And if you find the thrill too short, that slide it always is

then get in line,

and down you go,

flailing, joy-filled down you go,

its at that bottom that you breathe,

and take a lingering look back up

at how you held your breath, and fully llived

whizzed right down

the short,

exhilaration

that was

the poem.

A Book of Hope- Day 3

October 3, 2012October 3, 2012 ~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 24 Comments

Oh you are here. That’s so lovely. Shoulder to shoulder on this 31 Day mini jaunt through some of my favorite words. If you missed day 1 on ordinary and day 2 on savor you can skip over here and here and do a catch up of sorts.

She wants to fill a word container, like she’d fill a vase with fresh cut garden beauties, a loose arrangement.

She wants to fill a word container up with words stuck in the inner places waiting at the end of the que, patient as the English. Not their time, not their turn. The waiting sweetens, the waiting improves with age, like cheese and wine and marriage. A trio of age improved elements. Add her word container to the mix and make it a foursome.

They can play tennis, golf, cards these four.

Her container is named small h hope, her book. The one on Hope is written and is bound in the Holy, with words, sacred, words God-breathed. Red letters and words from the Trinity.

But her book of hope will spill words on the page. They will run like rabbits, down trails of hold on, cease worry, end despair, look for tomorrow, see through the wormholes in today.

She will release them on the white crisp paper and let them flow like riverlets. Jumping the beaver dams of apathy and malcontent and run unobstructed to deliver buckets of hope. Wet the pages with words kicking and screaming there is always hope.

She will draw from His book of hope and lean into Him. Ask for words, humbly and meekly. Give me words to scatter that tell of hope. Its linked by hyphens to trust and to knowing and faith.

She knows He knows of all her days, her hours.Where she and Hope have been together. When she loosed her hands and held less firm. When her threadbare rope looked like a string to her and him and they.

She can only tell her story, shaky, story, brave, story. Stammering, stuttering, hers.

But better bound in leather in its imperfect state than bound in her. He, the editor knows when to publish and release. She has lips and a mouth and a tongue to tell. The paper is just one place the words can buckle up and ride off. Buckle up and face forward. Wheels on the ground. They roll.

When loosed and left to flap unfettered, like drying sheets drape over backyard cord, breathing, flailing, singing sweet in green grass breeze. They point to new.

And new looks mercifully on the past and says stay, sit, heel. I will toss you a biscuit stay right there. Hope is on the way. Hope infuses her brilliant radiant joyous spirit in the from here forward.

But bound in leather, not by chains of pain, or links of past.

The book of little h hope, waiting in the que.

Until her day comes.