Tag: love

Poetry by Patrick Jennings
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Busy Market Street, Kashgar, Xinjiang Autonomous Region, Peoples Republic of China

No Greater; No Lesser

It’s easy enough to forget
Not all the world lives
In a land of strip malls
And freeways
With manicured lawns
And high rise apartments

Where a bicycle
May be a family’s
Only mechanical transportation
And great fortune buys
A donkey and a cart

It’s easy enough to forget
Even after having been there
Spent time with and among
The people of the world
Who consider themselves
Wealthy and secure
While owning so little material
Commanding so little wealth

The people
Who are no greater
And no lesser
For the value of their possessions
Or the education they are allowed
Or any other outward marker
I have been taught
Signifies sophistication
Civilization
Value

Are these not
People who love
No less
Laugh
No less
Live with vigour
And consequence
And meaning
No less

Who are to be valued
And loved
No less

It is the lesser of us
Who believe otherwise
And it is they
Whom I pity
If these lesser beings
Exploit those with less
Then it is they
Whom I abhor

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Poetry by Patrick Jennings
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Light in the Darkness, Crease Building, Riverview Hospital, Coquitlam, British Columbia, Canada

Light ~ Pic and a Word Challenge #389

The light within
Too dim
To illumine
My confines

A window
Lets in
The light
Of the world

Slight
Narrow
Itself confined
To a shaft

Enough to illumine

Patterns

Which become bricks
In one wall of my

Confinement

That there is a wall
Unnerves me
But a prison of bricks
Is preferable to one of darkness

So I welcome the light
Invite its wisdom
Its insight

Ask it

Is there more here than the bricks?

A soft, warm chuckle precedes its reply

There is
You will not like much of it
Many things in the light
Seem terrifying

That is the way of life
But so too is there beauty
And love
In the light

And while terror 
Is found easily enough
In the darkness
Love and beauty need light

I nodded
Contemplated for a moment
Then turned to the light

I accept this challenge

And so began
The journey to discover
Me

Continue reading Light ~ Pic and a Word Challenge #389
Poetry by Patrick Jennings
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Eternal Lights ~ Quaco Head Lighthouse- UNESCO Fundy Biosphere Reserve, St. Martins, New Brunswick, Canada

Eternal Light

They spoke across a divide
Wide as eternity
Two dim lights
On distant shores
Obscured by the haze
Of time

But for their light
They’d have lost each other
Utterly

Such is the nature of binaries
Each caught in the gravity
Of the other

Their light grew
As they consumed time 
With memories
And old promises
Spoken and unspoken
Still to be kept

The haze dispersed
The divide reduced
To a vision
A touch
An embrace

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Poetry by Patrick Jennings
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Xavier Rudd, Malkin Bowl, Stanley Park, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Xavier Rudd

Love fills him
Overflows
A river
A gentle flood
Of love
Washes over me
Over all of us
Fills us
Intoxicant

His smile
Radiant
A broadcast ecstacy
Writ across his face
An unfathomable beauty
Of being
Filled with love

I remember
Being filled like that
Being love
Being grateful
For every moment
In every moment

I remember
Being flawed
Knew I was flawed
Still, I was full with love

I remember
Being in pain
Debilitated by suffering
Still, I was full with love

I forgave the flaws of others
Because love forgave my own
While I worked to repair them

I empathized with the pain of others
Because love allowed me to feel my own
While I followed a healing path

So I thank him
Up on the stage
This beaming intensity
Of beautiful light
As I sing the refrains
As I sway
To the rhythms of the music
To the flow of his love
To this man
This beautiful man

Who is not without faults
Who is not without pain
Yet is filled to overflowing
With love

I thank him
For the reminder
That I can be filled with love
That I can be love
Without first making myself
Perfect

Because I have been
Before

Because in this moment
I am again

Continue reading Xavier Rudd