Missing You (poem)

 I thought you were real

I thought you were “the one”

I thought my day began and ended with you

I felt a connection to you

That surpassed so many other connections

And then the wind came

It blew my hair into a spin

For a moment my vision blurred

And when I cleared my space to look again

You were gone

And with you went my heart.

Despair, disappointment, sorrow and hope

Became my bedfellows

Taking turns consuming my mind

I managed some positive affirmation

To try to find some better feeling ground

But it was whip cream on top of trash

How could life spin me ‘round again

How could I be given

What I thought was the gift of a lifetime

Only for it to be taken away

But you tell me I never had it

That no one has anything

That for a moment we experience something

And there are no guarantees

This love that feels so good

But can cause so much pain

For a moment there, I wished I had never met you

Then I would have been spared the pain of you leaving

Just yesterday I was the apple pie of your eye

And today you prefer coffee.

I am done

No more.

I will never again allow my heart

To be like a rag dolly

Pushed and pulled and toyed with

My emotions taken so lightly

My depth squashed onto a shallow shore

Unable to express its love

Too painful….

Your “Hi Sweetie”

Turned into “Hi there”

You long lovely see-you-later

Turned into short goodbyes.

You tell me to be in the gift of the present

To let go of the past

But I liked the past

And feel uncomfortable in our present moments

Not knowing where to place my arms

Where they were always placed around you

Now they awkwardly dangle at my side

And my heart goes unfulfilled.

I don’t want this one sided love

That is now looking elsewhere to amuse itself.

Freedom is the lesson here

To set you free as you desire

So I have no place in your life, really

For my freedom was the soaring I felt

When your heart wrapped around mine.

I am counseled to understand where you are

You just came from another relationship

And I was your short transition

Into a new life

So keep this short

And say goodbye.

My collection of Romantic Poetry: To All the Men I've Loved can be found on kindle, also poems on cd from my website www.EmpireOfTheSunspirit.com  

Money and Sharing

Money had been pulling me in different directions. I was at once a being of Love and Light and then I had to pay bills in order to eat, to sleep, to have good health, to be reassured I’d be safe, to clean myself, to mend myself, to prepare myself for the future, to exist at all.  In short, I realized quickly that money was a necessary element to living on this planet.   Fast forward to a spiritual event where God or a Higher Power within that, when aligned, makes us feel that there is rhyme and reason for our existence.  We suddenly have an experience that gives us proof that there is good within us and in the world. We become changed.  We live differently, we give to our neighbors.  We look different to ourselves and to others.  Then another reality sets in.  Money.

We realize that we have bills that enjoy showing up in our lives to be paid in full, preferably.  We witness others begging for this green paper.  We see haves and have nots.  We note when others look at us as a dollar sign and ask us to give them green paper for things we do not need.  Suddenly, we forget some of our spiritual experiences.  The need to eat and pay bills and keep others (that are trying to sell us something so that they can eat, too) at bay becomes paramount.  We lose our previous experiences of sublime grace.  We become consumed with consumerism.  We now spend more time trying to calm our nerves to reassure ourselves that there is enough of this green paper coming into our lives, or at least more coming in than going out.  Our focus has changed. The God or Higher Power within that had us loving ourselves and each other has become replaced with the pulling need to pay for lettuce and rice milk. 

Our priorities shift and our blood level changes and our nervous system becomes tuned to a rat race to pay bills and eat, to maintain our shelter and fix the holes in our shoes.  Life has turned into survival for oneself where it used to be concerned with sharing with another.  Emergency has occurred.  God or the Higher Power within is now thought of less than the green dollars that are needed to obtain transportation to our chosen holy shrine.  Nothing is more important now than that we can afford a way to live on this planet.  What happened to praise for the God or Higher Power within that is the yarn weaving the shawls of who we really are? What happened to the sheer delight of sharing?  What happened to the open hearted, open armed ways of being that trusted that the last crust of bread shared would somehow be replaced with more because there was faith in the Unseen Abundance that weaves its threads through the many. What happened?  We spend more time thinking about escaping our life than rejoicing in it.  More time chasing the green dollar than having an intimate conversation with another. More time working than sharing our love with another.  What happened? 

What happened to our faith in Unseen Abundance, in heart to heart sharing and trusting in this now moment.  It became replaced with a bill that said due now or forfeit your shelter, forfeit your food, your ability to provide for ones that might count on you, forfeit your dignity to live equally among others.  Something happened.   We gave up en masse our spirituality and replaced it with the green dollar that we prayed to show up in more plentiful ways.  Our deep inner peace now has nothing to do with a Higher Power, but the amount of money we have to allow us to stay in our comfort zones.  What Happened?

We hear that money and God or Higher Power within is the same energy. That it is all Love and there is no separation.  We learn that once we have the peace of love in our hearts that money will flow in because there won’t be the energy of lack that attracted an absence of something needed or desired.  So, we have made God or the Higher Power within the energy that attracts good, the absence of doubt, the absence of lack, the presence of fullness that fills with its confidence that there is always more of a good thing.  What happened to this knowing? What happened to these teachings? What happened?  Instead of remembering that what we desire is ours once we know we have it now, even if we cannot see it with our eyes, we have only trusted what we can see.  We see with human eyes, whereas before we saw with an opened third eye that saw what wasn’t there physically until it became manifest in this apparent third dimensional reality. 

Our faith was put to the test:  see it by feeling it even if you cannot actually see it and then you will be able to actually touch it; it will be made manifest.   What happened to these teachings?  We lost our faith and replaced that with effort.  We became exhausted from doing and lost our concept of being.  We started to pull energy from each other instead of getting it from a Higher Source. We saw the bread in front of us as more important that what we were fed from within.  We began to live in the third dimensional world only and starved ourselves for any higher connection. What we now call spiritual is but a mere shell of the potential that is within us.  Our connection to what is Unseen is so starved for that we can only reach for money instead because this we can see. We lost our sight for the Unseen, closed the shutters on the window of the third eye, and became obsessed with things and others to fill what cannot be filled from the third dimension.

There is only one thing left to do now.  We must not do until we see each action as coming from a Higher Purpose.  Gathering of money must not be for oneself alone but also for the betterment of all. We must go back to a desire to share from the heart. This is who we really are.  We are those that share from the heart. Anything else is not who we really are. We cannot survive as a planet unless we redeem ourselves by going back to who we really are:  those that share with each other from the heart. Then, our actions are infused with a Higher Energy because they have a Higher Purpose.  Sharing from the heart is simple and yet we are taught to feed are own mouths and fill our own pockets and stand in line first, to be the early bird who gets the worm.  We run to beat our neighbors who might get in line before us.  We must fight our tendency to be selfish with the concept from the Kabbalah: To receive in order to share.  

Going Home from Belize

This will obviously be out of order because writing has to do that sometimes.  If you write by order delineated by time, you could miss the crispness of the current moment.  Picking up pieces from the past to sweep it all together, forces the mind into linear thinking. But, my mind is not like that. It has to be free to roam as it pleases, going back and forth into time and back out of it again. 

In that case, we will start at the present moment, outside of linear time, and then go back to pick up pieces and somehow string them together, I hope in a coherent style.  I am in Dallas Fort Worth airport, looking at the words Palm Springs on the flight departure sign.  I keep looking at it.   I am flying home.  Before this, it was not home.  Nor was the U.S.  I didn’t know where home was in terms of earth plane dwelling.  I was looking for home.  Now I know I am going back home. I look around me. The floors are clean, the walls are clean, when they use the intercom it actually works, no one is trying to copy Americans or the Western way of living, the lights are clear and there are no missing letters in the neon displays, there are no beggars and…this next one needs its own sentence.  Full Stop.   The bathrooms are free of charge; you don’t have to pay to use them.  Well, actually, that sentence above should be in its own paragraph.  Full Stop. 

  It is that important to one who does not have a bladder the size of a camel’s.  Camels make better travelers.  They are just equipped for it and they do not carry their own baggage. They may carry other people’s baggage, but they do not carry their own. I, on the other hand, carried my own baggage.  I mean this literally and figuratively.  I carried too many things and too many internal thoughts that did not serve me.  I went to Belize to show me the details of both and to shed what I could.  Luckily, I come back with all of my things intact save for my salt water laden towel which I left at the Mayan village of San Felipe in the Toledo district, at a small chocolate maker, but that story is for another time.   

The other type of baggage, the internal kind, I have made spiritual intentions to let go in every cave I entered, at every sacred site I have seen, even in taxi cabs, in between telling stories of where I have been and where I don’t want to revisit.  I can say now, with assurance, that I do return to the Palm Springs, California area, with less to carry on the inside.  The same is not with regards to my luggage, but that is also another story.  Traveling does that, if we allow it.  We come back with more things maybe, but hopefully less internal stuff that no longer serves.  All that we no longer need, meaning dead end thoughts and feelings that lead us to ground hog day circles chasing empty dreams to nowhere or rehashing past memories until they are more refined and ground than mashed potatoes, are let go of.  All of those can be let go in one gesture: Get Grateful for What We Have. End of Story.  Full Stop.

But, we often don’t do that. Many times we go on a trip and become thankful for a time, but then return to our habits of taking what we have for granted.  Gratitude is the fastest way to complete and eternal peace.  It can clean out mind debris in one cleansing gentle rain of thanks.  I’d like it to stick this time.  I’d like for all of my prayers to change my neuro-chemical vibration to pure Gratitude, where all of my neuron pathways are lined with the frequency of Gratitude so that all of my blood cells that travel their own course through my body are submerged in the frequency of all that is Good, of all that is Grateful.  Then, once and for all, I can go home internally and rest in peace while I am living. 

I have to admit, I came on this trip thinking I would die.  It’s not that I planned it, but I thought that perhaps it was my time to let go of struggle and I thought maybe death would do it.  I went snorkeling, turning around to see if a shark was my answer, though I didn’t want to go that way.  I got bit by a dog only to find out that the area had a bout with rabies and urged vaccinations a short while back. It hadn’t occurred to me to ask if the dog had been inoculated.  I wondered if that was the way I would go.  But, a hotel manager phoned the owners for me.  Nope, it would not be rabies.  I saw a bug that was called the Kiss of Death, more dangerous than the eight known venomous snakes in Belize and the jaguar put together.  I walked with vampire bats flying around me.  No, it would not be that way either.  The bus drive from Toledo in the south to Belize City to catch an airplane was also a possibility. The driver was skilled in the martial arts of bus driving.  His soul, passion, and whole life story was revealed in his steering wheel techniques.  He was telling his song with his generous honking alleviating his need to scream his plight through words.  His smooth ability to pass like an eel stealing its way into a narrow passage showed his near misses and how he got by in his life. Like many of us sitting on the hot seats of his magic carpet bus, we, too held the strings of our life sometimes by our teeth nearly missing the bite of a good catch.

Today is a Sacred Day (poem)

Today is a Sacred Day

and I don’t know why.

Today is a Sacred Day

and I don’t know why.

I will not follow you

as you go to work,

bored to death

So looking forward to lunch,

glancing at the clock for the day to end.

Nor will I follow you to school

so sleepy in your stupor

of boredom to tears

that you eat your lunch at recess

stealing away any chance you get

to eat snacks in the restroom

while others obey in quiet madness.

I will not go with you to bars

while you drown out the time

distracting your wakefulness

with inebriating substances.

Did you forget that today is a Sacred Day?

But, I don’t know why.

I just know you forgot this.

You forgot the word “sacred”

as you crammed “normal” down your throats

and succumbed to another day of monotony,

planning a weekend of distraction,

but when you get there,

there is little left to celebrate.

You forgot that today is Sacred

So, I will not follow you

as you obey the world around you

as you conform to its rules and regulations

as you clock in and out

as you say “yes” to others’ demands

and forget you stand on sacred ground.

No, I will not follow you.

Today is a Sacred Day,

But I don’t know why.

I just know I will not follow you

As you try to strip away dignity and individual guidance.

I hear another call

and it is not your bells nor alarms

waking you to another day

that looks too much like the next.

You train your children

to be dead in their hearts,

But, I will not stop to watch you.

Today is a Sacred Day

And I will listen to my own guidance

Showing me a Sacred Way. 

Lara De Ann is a poet and healer.  Check out her book  Piece of Planet or Planet of Peace: A Journey Through Letting Go Told in Prose and Poetry found on her website www.EmpireOfTheSunspirit.com   

Go Ask Lara #9, mother loses custody of her baby in divorce

Dear Lara,

I cannot even understand why I am able to form sentences or speak or reach out for help.  I was in a court battle with my ex and he had a better lawyer than I did.  He managed to get full custody of our 13 month old baby.  They used everything they could against me and I cannot believe I lost completely.  I feel like killing myself only my mother lost her husband, my father, already and I don’t want to put her through losing a daughter also.  I don’t expect anything to help me at this point, but I felt compelled to write you. 

Feeling Crazy and on the Edge of Insanity,

T.L. in AZ

Dear T.L.,

I cannot imagine what you must be going through.  I have “heard” a message from Divinity to tell you.  Abraham, as channeled by Esther Hicks, a group entity that is pure wisdom and love, teaches us that it is not easy to go from a low vibration to a high vibration.  That is difficult and uncomfortable, to say the least. However, this is what I am hearing for you to do.  Look at is as an Olympic challenge that you are capable of, if you focus well enough.  Understanding that a huge vibrational shift is not easy is important.  You will be aware of what you are embarking on and will be better equipped for the journey. It is sort of like knowing that you will encounter snow and ice, being prepared helps you tremendously for the trek. 

If you go to therapists, sitting in offices, talking about your woes, you will not shift your vibration very much.  You might feel better sometimes, but you will go back to the vibration of sorrow and despair most likely.  You can go to support groups, but others there will hold a low vibration of sadness and you will pick their sorrow up and add that to your own.  You are being called for a soul challenge here.   Find the best music that suits you, that is uplifting and has a strong beat to dance to.  Use your rhythm, your passion for dance to lift you out of the quicksand that would only pull you down further and create other problems.  Force yourself, no matter how you feel, to dance to this music for at least 45 minutes a day.  If you can do it more than once a day, good.  If only for 30 minutes twice a day or even once a day, keep doing this.  When you are dancing, let go of everything, every thought.  Just feel the body moving and hear the music and be transported.  Allow yourself to get beyond the sorrow by sweating and moving with rhythm.  Your goal is to feel joy from the dance and music as much as possible.  Even if you feel so down you cannot get up and feel tired and cannot move from depressed lethargy, dance anyway.  If you like to sing, add that as well. 

It is quite a challenge to nudge yourself into joy when your vibration is far from that.  The music and movement will help you get there.  You won’t have to do this with your own will and volition. The energy of passion and the inspiration of the sounds in the music will assist you.   Your task is to put the music on and clear the space to dance and force yourself to do that even if you feel like not existing.  This will make you extremely strong.  Again, it is an extreme challenge to go from acute sorrow to the joy of dance with energetic, uplifting music. The music choice is key here.  It has to be pushing you to move just by hearing it. It has to take you out of your mind and emotions and into an uplifting energy vibration.   Spend time gathering the right kind of music for yourself.  

Set your intention for what you are embarking on. This is Magic.  It is alchemy.  It is shifting from one reality to another, from one vibration to another with the aid of movement and sound.  Again, if you feel like singing, sing.  But, keep to uplifting sounds.  Your blood cells will respond and your aura will reflect the energy shift.  Bring in help from the Higher Realms as you do this so that you feel supported in this embarkation.  This is a huge journey across a vast ocean. But, if you stick to it, you will encounter a Self you have never known before.  Your inner strength will amaze you.   This applies to any tragedy.  But, there are different remedies depending on the person and if they have legs to dance or vocal cords.    In your case, use what you have.  You have your legs, your hearing and your rhythm.  Use these to jump to another vibratory category.  Keep at this for an extended time period, if not forever.   Your diligence will be rewarding to the rest of the world who will gain much with you, energetically.  

Good luck on this journey!  Don’t miss a day.  Each day is sacred.  

Lara

Lara De Ann is a writer of books available on www.EmpireOfTheSunspirit.com and e-books currently on Kindle.  She also gives Insightful Guidance over the phone.  As a non-religious Ordained Reverend, she does spiritual weddings and memorial services.