Category: Uncategorized

The Greatest Of These Is Love

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ Leave a comment

wp-1458134129111.jpg

 

 

Join me today at Grace Table?  My words and I are over there telling a love story. A story of love.

“It wasn’t love at first sight, but it was love very soon after we wrapped our heads and hearts around one important realization. Beauty lay behind the fringes of the dirt. Redemption could be found on the frayed edges of the brokenness. Restoration would require patience and sweat equity. It would demand waiting. And it would call for trust. But it would return much more than it could ever have asked of us.

This was a transaction of the heart. And we would be reminded that love wins every time.

Thank you, as always, for joining me at the table….(Click the link to read “The Greatest Of These Is Love”.)

+++++++++++++++

“A Quiet Place For Words” my tinyletter.com newsletter is being sent to subscribers today. Sign up here to join me there.

When You Want To Start Over From The Very Beginning

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 5 Comments

I have a young friend who is brave and beautiful. I’ve known her for a long forever. Since she was a child, Bennett has been a sweet part of my world. Gentle and kind, soft-spoken and a lover of beauty. These words come rest on my lips, as I begin to paint her with my words, speaking honestly about the young woman I know, respect and love. I word paint her through the lens of my poetry. And I paint her artist. Lover of all that is waiting to be discovered.

Now I  sit with different  words. I have found joy anew as I watch her enter the world of a painter. Bennett has bravely left a career which required four years of college and  a Master’s Degree. And now I call her bold. And passionate.

This fresh young artist is filled with passion and bravery as she pursues life as a painter. Embracing the gifts she was given long ago with enthusiasm. With energy. And with whimsy in every stroke.

As a child she loved painting and making art. Her determination shows up in brilliant shades of life. On every canvas, she pours her soulful interpretation of the world. Haiti, Aspen, Miami, The South Carolina Lowcountry and Charleston – each of these places influence and inspire her art. Each of Bennett Brown Sizemore’s paintings is a decidedly unique snapshot of the world. Bennett’s style is unique and remarkable and a bit undefinable. It is at once simple and elegant, teeming with an exuberance which is palpable. The world seen through her paintbrush is brilliant and whimsical. Hope-filled and radiant. Her passion was curled up in the cocoon of her heart. Waiting to be unfurled. Fully. For us to savor and enjoy.

What a gift she is using. What a gift she gives. To Him be the glory.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

So now I want to start over and begin again with my own art. With my writing. But I cannot really go back to my first day when I stepped into my own passion as a writer.

But in His mercy we can begin again, infused with re-newed passion. Restored to our art. Regenerated in our spirits to see the world, though there is pain and grief, in all its beauty. And to marvel. With a re-commitment to press on as co-creators with Artist God. To live into the privilege we’ve been given. To paint the world or to paint our experience in a way which allows us to live any moment a glorious second time.

As artists we process the world through our medium. We show and tell others where the beauty lies. And point to the extra-ordinary ordinary in a world filled with endless amounts of simple beauty. Extravagant beauty.

Who can we encourage today. Who can we cheer on and say “Go Make Your Art”.

Today I choose Bennett because Bennett Sizemore  inspires me. And in some small way or a decidedly significant way, I am inspired anew to create and to press on with my art. And to marvel at the beauty, wonder and colorful whimsy of the world through Bennett Sizemore’s lens.

Bennett Sizemore Art

 

 

Have I Told You Lately…that I love this book

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 3 Comments

wp-1455205660746.jpg

You can love someone without ever touching their skin, seeing the whites of their eyes (as my grandmother would say), or sharing tea, coffee or wine in the corner of your favorite cafe. And you can grow to respect and care deeply for someone whom you have never had the pleasure of “meeting in the flesh.”

You can long after a place you’ve never been or seen. Dream of a one day or a right now. Long for a place called home that you know in your soul can exist, does exist and more importantly will be embraced. In time. At the “just right time”. And dream that love and life will thrive and grow. When tended and nourished through every season of a year. This is the power of hope.

Christie and I have never met. At least not yet. And yet I call her friend. We share a love of words and of old homes, good food, chickens, gardens and of family. We both have the honor of contributing as monthly writers at GraceTable.Org. A community that fosters the friendships of its writers.

Here are the words I used  in my Amazon review to describe “Roots and Sky”, her soulful book just published by Revell Books:

From the earliest places of this book, through the thoughtful middle and up until the final page, there exists a beautiful and poetic enveloping. Writer of reader. Loosely held was I, within every page and every line. A masterful and authentic storyteller, Purifoy covers us with her rich lyrical prose. With artful subtlety and nuance, she is at once gifted as a story-teller and as a contemplative writer. Purifoy achieves a gathering up of the reader to herself with this memoir. We are held tenderly as we listen. And somehow we discover our own stories as she tells her own. Purifoy’s writing bares her individual journey and yet touches on universal themes that draw us in. The rhythms of life, love and of seeking God in every crack and crevice of Maplehurst are unveiled with a richness that rings authentic and poetically throughout.

Upon my completion of “Roots and Sky,” I was hungry to go back and read through again. Pen in hand. Ready again for the exquisite voice of Purifoy. (And I wanted to go dig in the dirt of my own old Victorian home. To explore and grow. Uncover and plant.) Purifoy’s passions of place and for home and family are contagious, indeed. And now I eagerly await her second book.

 

Since this review, I have spent additional time within the pages of “Roots and Sky.” I’ve revisited some of my favorite lines. Flipped around and stumbled on new gems from Christie. I have read lines aloud on Instagram (@graceappears). And now I am sharing here. Sharing the goodness of “Roots and Sky” because I believe this is a book that seeps into the soul. Lyrically and honestly.

And, truly, what more can we ask from a book than to be authentic, honest, lovely and real.

One day I know I will have tea with Christie. But if this certainty of mine never comes to pass, I know her well through her writing. And what more can we ask from a writer but to reveal the honest places of her life, her very soul. Her triumphs, her tragedies and her dreams. This is the beauty of “Roots and Sky.”

While following Christie through four seasons at her beloved Maplehurst, we are invited to dream and hope, always hope, as we discover the beauty of simplicity and the joy of finding our place in the world.

This weekend I will be giving a couple of copies away over at my other writing home “A Quiet Place For Words.” Once weekly-ish I mail a little letter to subscribers. Join me there?

I hope you win. I wish I had a box the size of all outdoors to give to all my people. I love this book that much.

peace and grace,

e

wp-1455212729722.jpg

 

#Marvelous

~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 3 Comments

wpid-img_20150801_114350.jpg

Dear Marvelous:

You found me. Perhaps I found you. We found each other. We are now sojourners for a journey of days and weeks and seasons, through the calendar of 2016. While the earth spins and turns, we will look for the poetry. Together.

We missed the early days. We had not found each other yet when January began her spartan dance, slow and waltzing. Fresh with hope. So we are shy a full deck of 365. But we press on in the remaining. Linked. Arms hooked. You are an encourager of delight, a finder of the extraordinary and a lover of whimsy.

You are not the Pollyanna that some may think. You are not the eternal optimist. The wearer of rose-colored glasses. You are green with new birth. Effervescent with joy in the face of discovery. Yes, you are life-giving and eager to delight in the best. Often the simple.

The “m” sits on the edge of pursed lips, determined and brave and pushes off like a swimmer doing the butterfly. A graceful lunge. Into the realm of wonder and possibility. A sea of mystery and marvel. High tides, low tides. Ebbing and flowing. Always tossing up the treasures to be collected on the edges of our walk.

So there you are. Light in the dark. Warmth in the cold. You shade and color the nuances of life with glorious richness. With exquisite simplicity. Elegance in the simple. You are regal as a peasant in her everyday-ness. You are riches in the rags. Hope in despair. Light in the shadows.

Marvelous, you are a mindset. A lens. A capturer of life’s best and rarest. A treasure seeker. A seeker of intrigue.

Thank you for choosing me. Here’s to a year of marveling together. At all the mystery. Through the pain. Into the dark days. Around the deep ditches and past the hurdles of sorrow. Over, under, around.

Here’s to uncovering the marvelous. For you and for me. In the everyday. In every day. In Him and by Him. Glory be to the Creator of the marvelous.

amen,

e

wp-1452525058250.png