Encouragement: A Prayer, A Poem, A Cry

May 15, 2013 ~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 8 Comments

One phrase haunts me, chases me down daily.
There is nowhere for me to go but stare at it steely eyed daily.
Wrestle with it, sit with it, stare at it, and ponder what it means for me,
To do.
My recent past dredged this up, dredges it up from the silt daily.
Once I penned some words here, scratched out some heart thoughts.
They have taken on a life of their very own, a heart, legs and off they ran.
All around this interwebby world.
Words can run fast as the wind.
Lace them up with care and grace.

One phrase echoes daily on these pages, behind the scenes in the land of stats.
I can’t come here without seeing them there.
I wrote a piece one time or two, boldly with the words
encouragement, tucked in or standing out front.
That is it – the beginning and the end of this prayer, poem, cry.

When I ask Him what to do with my words
They become my true north but I stray
Clothe in grace, wrap in love, encourage.

The number is big, so I won’t say it, it changes almost daily.
Someone finds me here,
My words and me
Googling, encouragement
A letter of encouragement, encouragement for a friend
Words have wings and I pray
They find good here.

Prayerfully, thoughtfully, deeply I cry out
Oh Lord.

Take the clay of my words, Maker of My Soul.
Grab my pen and guide it while it glides along the page.

She is writing
It’s a work of Wordsworth and poetry and nature and High School English
And I can stand in my mother stance over my daughter dear
And say these words to her
We are two and it is intimate and close
Write it like you want to, just say what you mean
You can do it spills from my heart to hers.
She makes art wobbly shaky on a page.
And I know.

If you came here on a trail of encouragement, following bread crumbs
Find it, friend and grab it
He is standing over you, before you and around you.

God is loving, reigning, holding you in the heavenlies this day.

She is writing,
And it is a work in progress
Clothe her in grace and love.

I am the launcher of words, clothe me in guided grace.

We, lover of You and lover of words, steady each mark of our pen and infuse it and us with You.

Encouragement, may it always live here.
Tucked within the lines of poetry
And prose.

Amen? Amen.

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Joining my precious and encouraging friend Jennifer Dukes Lee today.

Not As They Appear, These Things, At All

March 18, 2013March 19, 2013 ~ Elizabeth W. Marshall ~ 7 Comments

Feet in the sand blue sky canopy we step into the day. She painter, artist, friend. I write.
We walk into the day. She paints. I weave words, slice them up and move them all around.
There is an unfurling that begins, feet hit the ground, sun up, eyes up. It is what it is.
Or it is what you see, you see. Or how.

You should paint that.. I say, she sees. We see together, we see different.
And I tell her what it is that I am seeing in the rags flapping in the wind. Barnacle laiden flying into the blue.

I tell her of my love for what looks like burlap, though it is not. When we look closer, the burlap was a mesh. It was not as it appeared.

We see different.

And isn’t that the way of the artist. Her art hangs on gallery wall, exhibited and displayed in place of prominence, by selection. Money changes hands between artist and art lover.

Her beautiful eye and her beautiful hand and her beautiful palette of paints will see the world in one beautiful way. The way of artist Laurie.

So she will not paint the flapping brown rags released on line to dry out in the sun, bake out the pluff mud this tool of Lowcountry oyster catcher man.

No she will not paint it, not at all. She will not, can not paint it, paint them, filthy rags.

She will not paint the worn bags on a canvas, capture the bits of white stuck in the mesh like diamonds adorning the fabric of royal silk. Value and beauty in the rubble hanging and dancing in the salty Lowcountry wind, this day.

They whisper to me, come write my story.

Of where I have been drenched in the sea in worn hands of man. Of where I have been dragged across the jagged shore and held the shells which hold the pearl. Holding on and holding dinner.

Out to sea and back again. Out and back, dragged and drug and hung again. To flap and sail swinging in the wind. Tool of man, art to one.

And feet back in the sand, dog in hand, under the oaks we walk and talk. Hit the road. And stop to stare at peacock, hen. As she stands statuesque. I know this bird. But if we had not met I would have thought her dead, not alive. Her stillness, still as stone, her glassy stare belied a bird alive.

Things different. Things changed. Things not quite as they appear after all.

And painter friend she sees what I do not. This walk of artists in the sand. Brings eyes. They collide seeing different. Seeing same.

The Lowcountry littered with joggling boards. Rite of passage for every child along the way. In the south, for children’s play.

And lady peacock, hen has her own. A perch which I could not see. My eyes beheld the beauty only of the bird. At first.

But two together, they double the image, compound beauty.

Bird on a beam. Bird on a board. Bird suspended mid-air. We stare.

So painter, writer see the world through different eyes. But the beauty is compounded when combined.

So husband, father, wife and mother, Christian One and Christian Two. We all do. Our views collide and complement. Artist, painter, artist, writer.

He brings his eyes and I bring mine. She sees the bird up on the board. At first I see the peacock hen and then the board. She is my improved vision. She corrects the lens on life. He is my improved vision. He corrects my lens on life. The complement, the shift in view. Four eyes, two hearts can see together what alone we cannot.

Four friends in search of oysters for our meal and we prefer the singles. Stop by the market ,ask around. Ask some more. The singles are the best and more expensive than the others. The clusters are less desirable in the oyster world.

We buy the clusters or it is no oysters at all. Grab the knives, hold them hot. Fresh from the steamer, grab the hot sauce, lemon and the saltine cracker, eat them up. Can’t get enough. Oysters, hot, delicious clusters. We convert. We elevate these mangled masses of jagged shell to a status new for lover of this delightful delicacy.

And in the world of seafood too. Things are not as they appear. There is delicious delight en masse in groups. These clusters delight the souls of man under the crescent moon. Split open each with a frenzied pace. And let them slide down the throat into the belly.

If you love oysters.

You would love the clusters. The singles no where to be found, the hot commodity. In demand.

We huddle up and split open each, one by one, the oysters held in groups of white grey calloused shell.

The gift is in the blended views. We are lost. We are found. We are both.

We are better with each other. Artist, writer, painter, friend, husband, wife, Christian One and Christian Two. Poetry and prose.

I need you. You help me see. I am found. I am lost. I am both.

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Joining Laura and Ann today.

And counting gifts with Ann

*New ways of seeing life

*Old friends

*Days on the coast, rediscovering old favorites

*Consoling a child in her grief and finding beauty in the loss of life. Somewhere.

*Hearing a friend’s words at just the right time.

*Watching the dog herd her free range chickens. And delighting in the dance and art there

*Walking in the sun

*Walking under the moon

*New mercies

*New vision

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

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.