Tag Archives: Dance

359. Every child is born a naturalist. His eyes are, by nature, open to the glories of the stars, the beauty of the flowers, and the mystery of life. ~Author Unknown

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As stillness in stone to silence is wed,
May solitude foster your truth in word.

As a river flows in ideal sequence,
May your soul reveal where time is presence.

As the moon absolves the dark of distance,
May your style of thought bridge the difference.

As the breath of light awakens color,
May the dawn anoint your eyes with wonder.

As spring rain softens the earth with surprise,
May your winter places be kissed by light.

As the ocean dreams to the joy of dance,
May the grace of change bring you elegance.

As clay anchors a tree in light and wind,
May your outer life grow from peace within.

As twilight pervades the belief of night,
May beauty sleep lightly within your heart.
~John O’Donohue

Look to the LORD and his strength; seek his face always. Remember the wonders he has done, his miracles, . . . ~1 Chronicles 16:11-12 ✝

Thank you, Lord Jesus, that you save, you heal, you restore, and you reveal Your Father’s heart to us! You have captured me with grace and I’m caught in Your infinite embrace!

**Photo taken by Lessy Sebastian

353. God’s gifts put man’s best dreams to shame. ~Elizabeth Barrett Browning

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Everything is determined,
the beginning as well as the end,
by forces over which we have no control.
It is determined for insects
as well as for the stars.
Human beings, vegetables or cosmic dust,
we all dance to a mysterious tune,
intoned in the distance by an invisible piper.
~Albert Einstein

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As the invisible and creating Piper of all that is stages His springtime drama, He plays His primordial tunes. These harmonies are invitations to the mysterious dance of life He ignited. Between the lines of His holy, ancient melodies are heard His summons for all to partner with Him and dance in His arms o’er fields of grace and glory. In response to these calls bees and butterflies are already bowing and accepting the Lord’s summons to step onto the dance floor. Making ready for the ball as well have been the birds who’ve been courting and preparing nests. Soon their fledglings will take wing and join in the chorus of the spheres and the stars, and together the whole of Creation’s voices will spew forth worship, praise, and glorious odes to joy. The period for rest has passed and the days for celebration and rejoicing have come. It is time to look at what is laid upon earth’s “table” and as invited guests to express gratitude for the banquet. It is not happenstance that we are here, and like the flowers in a garden, perhaps our anointed time to bloom is upon us.

Sing to the LORD, for He has done glorious things; let this be known to all the world. -Isaiah 12:5  ✝

Thank you, Lord Jesus, that you save, you heal, you restore, and you reveal Your Father’s heart to us! You have captured me with grace and I’m caught in Your infinite embrace!

341. So pure, so still the starry heaven, so hushed the brooding air, I could hear the sweep of an angel’s wings… ~Edna Dean Proctor

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Our Lord has written
the promise of resurrection,
not in books alone,
but in every leaf in springtime.
~Martin Luther

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Creation is a perpetual outpouring of God’s creative and loving selfhood. The sacred isn’t merely above us but forever within the entire body of Creation. The holy sound of God resonates in everything. The earth gives us reason to feel His gracious hand upon us while the forces of heaven sustain us. These realities are meant to stir in humanity a sense of belonging and in turn spark a desire to seek the Lord, but should they not, finding God in Christ is something even the blind can do. Our Creator sent us His son over 2,000 years ago, and He came to be our memory and to remind us of who we are and to whom we belong. Jesus is a revelation of our loving Father and His Kingdom’s intention. Christ offers salvation to the children of the Light who are subjected to temptation by malevolent forces, and He is a leader who directs God’s children into righteous rhythms of life, into a willingness to serve others, and into the dance of life–a dance in which the whole universe partners.

I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know Him better.  ~Ephesians 1:17  ✝

Thank you, Lord Jesus, that you save, you heal, you restore, and you reveal Your Father’s heart to us! You have captured me with grace and I’m caught in Your infinite embrace!

330. The birds pour forth their souls in notes, of rapture from a thousand throats. ~William Wordsworth

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Happier of happy though I be, like them
I cannot take possession of the sky,
Mount with a thoughtless impulse and wheel there
One of a mighty multitude, whose way
And motion is a harmony and dance
Magnificent…
~William Wordsworth

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A few weeks ago much of the ground in my garden was bare and seemingly bereft of life; now growing things are exploding from every plot, nook, and cranny. Even things I didn’t sow or plant are coming forth thanks to the winter winds and birds who sowed seeds for me. The bird population, as it does every spring, has swelled as well; the air is filled with the fluttering of wings, the building of nests, and joyful birdsongs. And what sweet melodies the birds sing for mankind! It does indeed seem that they “pour forth their souls in notes, of rapture from a thousand throats.” And as I listen, I find myself wondering how many birds have sung these same songs since the beginning of time. The number would probably stagger my imagination, but whatever it is would be more than enough to remind me that each of us is here with as much of a Divine purpose as they. Why, might one ask does their singing bring that thought to mind? It’s something that occurred to me long ago when I read, “A bird doesn’t sing because it has a reason. It sings because it has a song.” So now that thought always reminds me that every one of us has a voice, a “song” of some kind that’s capable, like the birds, of bringing a joyful noise into the world both for the Lord and for those mortals in need of hearing one.

Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all the earth: make a loud noise, and rejoice, and sing praise. ~Psalm 98:4 ✝

Thank you, Lord Jesus, that you save, you heal, you restore, and you reveal Your Father’s heart to us! You have captured me with grace and I’m caught in Your infinite embrace!

**Image via Pinterest

277. In the depths of winter I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer. ~Albert Camus

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A warm and cheery fire roars merrily
And shadows dance about the darkened room.
Beside the hearth a gardener sits and dreams
Of sunny days, of flowers in full bloom.
Some hollyhocks should tower near the fence,
Bright red ones that the bees can’t help but find.
The trellis at the gate again must wear
Blue morning glories, or the rosy kind.
To lend a bit of distance to the scene,
Close to the rear I’ll plant in shades of blue:
The tall and stately larkspur, double ones­
Of course I’ll put in scabiosa, too.
I couldn’t do without a pansy bed­
Snapdragons make such beautiful bouquets­.
Frilled zinnias and yellow marigolds
Add just the proper touch to autumn days.
The flowers grow and bloom with loveliness
Until a sound destroys the fantasy­
A burning ember falls and I must leave
My garden and my charming reverie.
~Helen Bath Swanson

I will sing to my God a new song: O Lord, you are great and glorious, wonderful in strength, invincible.  ~Judith (Apocrypha) 16:13  ✝

236. Everything in creation has its appointed painter or poet and remains in bondage like the princess in the fairy tale till its appropriate liberator comes to set it free. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Poetry is not always words.
Poetry is a layering of meanings…
Poetry evokes emotional or sensual responses…
Poetry creates musical or incantatory effects…
Poetry forms connections not previously perceived…
~Audrey Foris

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There are “wordless voices,” as Foris suggests, and they speak in a variety of ways.  Some are heard in music instead of poetry while others are witnessed in the spectacle of a drama or ballet, or they may be perceived in the steps and rhythm of a dance routine.  Humans can’t help but find a way to express what profoundly breaks into their inner silences and urges expression for they, being made in the image of a limitless Creator, are innately creative in some way.

As for me an artist or a poet I am not, but the desire to be gifted in such a way inhabits my soul.  I’ve tried my hand many times at being both but any real talent for either continues to be imprisoned within me.  So now with no “appropriate liberator” in sight I try only with my camera to satisfy the yearning of my incarcerated artist, and from time to time, at least in my own eyes, I achieve a marginal level of success.  How could I not for in its vast array of choices, the earth is a wondrous wellspring even with nothing more than a point and shoot camera.  As for my jailed poet self, her craving is partially satiated because life and the natural world have a way of writing their own poetry even in a photograph and because accomplished others have published readily, accessible poetic works.

So God created humankind in His image, in the image of God He created them; male and female He created them.  ~Genesis 1:27  ✝

234. Year’s end is neither an end or a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us. ~Hal Borland

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Time is the coin of your life.
It is the only coin you have, and only you
can determine how it will be spent.
Be careful lest you let
other people spend it for you.
~Carl Sandburg

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Recently I heard a college student talking about her graduate studies in Glasgow, Scotland.  As I listened, I remembered how much I’d wanted to study in Paris when I was her age.  That started me thinking about the life choices I’d made and wondering how different my life might have been had I chosen differently.  After pondering the matter for a few days, I came to the conclusion that geography changes very little, if anything.  One can dance and bloom and thrive wherever they are, and joy would be as joyful, sorrow be no less sorrowful, nor would trials be any less difficult.  Scripture states that time is more richly spent in the lives of people who choose to be happy wherever they are, who choose to do good while they live, and who choose to find satisfaction in all of their toils.

An example of God’s hand of blessing in blocking some of the choices one has to make came when my daughter who had 5 collegiate scholarships from which to choose was led to pick one that actually saved her life.  For tragically, at one of the universities she turned down, the girls on the swim team for which she was being recruited were all killed in a heart-rending bus accident that year.  So as another year ends and a new one starts, I praise the Lord who knows so much better than we about where and how to spend the time coin of our lives.  By His hand of goodness and mercy I did in fact finally get to Paris this last summer along with my daughter whose life had been spared so many years ago.

My wish today is that the “going on” of which Borland speaks brings each and everyone of you immeasurable blessings and that you encounter again and again the Holy One by whose Hand they will be delivered.

Trust in Him at all times, O people, pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us.  ~Psalm 62:8  ✝

222. Green thoughts emerge from some deep source of stillness which the very fact of winter has released. ~Michael Osler

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I danced in the morning when the world was begun
I danced in the moon and the stars and the sun;
I was called from the darkness by the song of the earth,
I joined in the singing and she gave me birth.

Dance, then, wherever you may be!
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he,
And I’ll lead you on, wherever you may be,
I will lead you all in the Dance, said he!

The moon in her phases and the tides of the sea,
the movement of the Earth, and the seasons that will be
Are rhythm for the dancing and a promise through the years–
The Dance goes on through joy and tears.
~Excerpts from the Lord of the Dance, traditional

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**Photo taken by Natalie on a foggy morning when a blue norther blew in to announce winter’s arrival

The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.  ~Mark 1:1  ✝

Music’s Mystery

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I’ve heard it said that only human beings have been given the gift of music; that only people create songs, sing and serenade their souls with this most magical and uplifting form of communication and communion. Yet, should we not consider the song of the lark? The haunting ballads of the whales? The mournful call of the wolf? The robin’s lyrical laugh at dawn and dusk? The crickets that serenade the nighttide? The burbles of monkeys swaying in the trees? The laughing of the hyena?

Who is to say that in their melodic tunes, caterwauls, howls, wails, and other worldly vocalizations there is not some measure of music. Why should we be the only ones to sing praise, to croon our love, and to bewail our distress? How can we know, in truth, in honesty, that the deliberate scree of the hawk, the piercing bugle of the elk, the chattering of raccoon and ferret, and the murmurings of infrasonic elephant calls is not music to their ears?

Music is a form of communication that lifts the soul, expresses emotion, and brings one being into contact with another being. If this is, indeed, the definition of music (of which it is a form) then can that being not be one other than human? Does not one wolf join another when it sings? Does not the whale song change season to season and year to year, picked up by another whale to be carried on? Does not one roaring lion inspire the entire pride by its lusty cry?

Consider what the morning would sound like without the sweet music of the birds. Contemplate what the summer night might be when not a single chirrup, trill, drone or buzz lilted through the air. Ponder how deep and lonely the oceans would be without the drifting, breathtaking songs of the whales. Can you even imagine a mountain landscape without hearing the echoing howl of a wolf or the bubbling laugh of the loon?

If these sounds, that can captivate us and uplift our thoughts, our hearts and even our souls, are not music and do not do the same for all those who hear them, regardless of race, than perhaps, we must follow that course of logic and say that cave paintings are not art, tap is not dance, improvisation is not acting and free verse is not poetry.

Or perhaps, Music Teaches the Soul what the Heart Feels and Guides the Heart with what only the Soul can Truly Know.

Music’s Mystery is by Morgan at:  http://booknvolume.com

179. November’s sky is chill and drear, November’s leaf is red and sear. ~Sir Walter Scott

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Pleasures lie thickest where no pleasures seem:
There’s not a leaf that falls upon the ground
But holds some joy of silence of sound,
Some spirits begotten of a summer dream.
~Laman Blanchard

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The first Sunday of November had been running out like slow, thick molasses as deepening autumn’s shades of gray hung on it like a shroud.  Even the flocks of busying birds and the foraging squirrels succumbed, as did I, to the hypnotic laziness of the day’s dark, engulfing gloom.  However, things became a little livelier for a time late in the day when the cement on the patio became a dance floor filled with tiny rain-drop dancers jitterbugging to the short-lived “drippy” rhythms.  After the rainy spell light broke briefly through the clouds, and it was enough to highlight a few colorful leaves and a potted petunia.  Together those two sights interjected a touch of color while the wrought-iron furniture that glistened in the light added a bit of beaded elegance to the drab scene.  How sweetly even a token display of earth’s delights can thrill this observer!

Surely then you will find delight in the Almighty and will lift up your face to God.  ~Job 22:26  ✝