Wednesday, October 2, 2013

So Much Like an Angel

 
So much like an angel,
She moved upon the green,
A quality grace and poise
And beauty seldom seen.
She took her place among the rest,
Yet shown above them all,
Like an angel in a painting
Of the heavens I recall.
She did not have a word to say,
And still I heard a song,
A music that surrounded her
And rose above the throng.
Now there she stands, a woman grown,
Of  loveliness and charm.
It seems that not long ago
I held her in my arm,
A newborn child with promise
From the moment of her birth
Brought a special bit of heaven
Upon this gloomy earth.
She brings with her the glory
Of some celestial light
To share in celebration
And brighten up the night.
 
Stan Sanford
©2002 Stan Sanford

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Little Things

 
We all stood there in disbelief
And watched the towers fall.
How could this be happening—
They stood so strong and tall.
Symbols of our wealth and power
In a pile of rubble lay.
We needed strength beyond ourselves
To make it through the day.
 
Some of us got angry.
We all felt weak inside.
Some of us just shook our heads,
And others of us cried.
Some of us got on the phone,
Some on our knees to pray.
We needed some connection
To make it through the day.
 
Some held a cherished wedding ring
Or the picture of a child.
Some of us took a stranger’s hand
And held it for a while.
Some of us listened to the wind
For something it might say.
We all needed something
To make it through the day.
 
Some days our worlds come crashing down.
Sometimes they just decay.
Sometimes it is the little things
That get us through the day
The kindness in a stranger’s smile,
The things that children say
Somehow give us faith and hope
To make it through the day.
 
Often I think how little things
Contain the power of life:
The cooing of my new-born child,
A love-note from my wife,
A kitten sleeping in the swing,
My little girl at play—
Sometimes it is the little things
That get me through the day.
 
 
©2001, Stan Sanford

Thursday, September 5, 2013

Hope for the Flowers*

Hope for the Flowers*
For Jessica Hope Sanford Lang
 
Hope for the flowers, the butterfly
Floats through the garden, free as the sky;
The essence of life on delicate wing,
Hope for the flowers that bloom in the spring.
 
Profusion of colors with fragrances sweet
Appear where the pollen and beating wings meet,
Thrilling the heart and stirring the soul,
Each individually part of the whole.
 
Hope, hope for the flowers,
only when the butterfly
Is free to fly as it chooses
to carry the essence of life.
 
Just being you abundantly gives
Hope to my life each moment you live;
Abounding in beauty with light from above,
You bring to the world God’s presence and love.
 
All of my life, I’d dreamed of you;
Pictured the things I’d want you to do;
For I had been hurt and wanted to stay
Protected in dreams with life all my way.
 
The butterfly must not be told
How it should fly, what it should hold;
I have no right to ask of you
Anything not of your heart free and true.
 
©Stan Sanford
May 2, 1996
 
*Jessica’s middle name came from the book,
Hope for the Flowers, by Trina Paulus.
 


Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Do You Hear the Wind Blow

Do You Hear the Wind Blow
~yhla xwr
 
Do you hear the wind blow?
What do you hear it say?
Can you hear it whisper?
Do you know the way
It moves upon the water,
It sweeps across the land?
Can you hear the wind blow?
Do you understand?
 

Listen to the wind blow

Stirring through the trees.
Listen to the wind blow
Moving o’re the  seas.
Do you hear the wind blow
Telling ancient tales.
Moving as the wind blows?
When it fills your sails?
 
Do you feel the wind blow?
Does it brush your face?
Can you sense its movement,
Its judgment and its grace?
Does it give you breath of life?
Does it renew your youth?
Do you feel a warmth or chill?
Do you hear its truth?
 
©Stan Sanford, 2011
 

Sunday, May 19, 2013

Conversation

 
I spoke to myself;
No response I received.
I ignored myself;
And, thus self deceived,
I spoke to my friend,
But my friend turned away.
My friend did not care
Or had nothing to say.
I spoke to the wind;
The wind asked me why.
When I could not answer,
The wind passed me by.
I spoke to heaven,
To that realm in the sky;
The heavens were silent;
I received no reply.
I spoke to the Presence;
In a voice very thin,*
I heard words as pleasant
As ever have been.

©2013, Stan Sanford
*I Kings 19:11-12 ("still small voice,"
Hebrew: "the voice of a thin silence.")

Thursday, March 21, 2013

They Were Giants

They were "Giants in the Earth,"
But the vast empty prairie
Swallowed Beret
And drug her into its dark bowels,
Replicating its emptiness in her soul.
Her closest companion, Per,
Could offer no solace--
Could not penetrate
The tomb that encased her life.
 
He was seventeen,
Reading the classic novel
For his literature class.
The tentacles of Beret's pain reached out for him,
Luring him into her morbid embrace,
As would some clandestine lover,
Drawing the innocent youth
To her bed.
He fell into the void of her soul,
Feeling as minuscule in the universe,
As she on the Dakota frontier.
 
His mind retreated from his body,
As he lay on a small cot
In a corner of a South Georgia farmhouse.
In an infinite regression,
He plummeted into outer darkness
Beyond the edge of the universe.
There, as the last remaining
Shred his sanity melted into nothingness,
He awoke in the light of Mind,
Ultimate Reality.
Time and space dissolved;
His mind became one with Mind.
Revelation!
His mind envisioned
The universe,
Universes beyond universes,
Universes within universes.
From the perspective of Mind,
All reality condensed into
A dimensionless point.
They were giants.
 
©2013, Stan Sanford
Reference: Giants in the Earth, Ole Edvart Rølvaag

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

When I Said, "I Love You"


When I said, "I love you,"
Fourteen years ago,
I meant in the depths of who I am--
Much more than emotion,
An intentional intuitive choice.
 
Things were bright and shiny then:
We made the best of presentations,
As lovers always do, at first,
All genuine, no deception intended.
 
As the years have gone by,
The flaws surfaced--
All that we have been
That make us what we are,
The warts, the scars, the failures--
Threatening to destroy us.
 
The Power that drew us
To each other
Defines us as much more than
Our warts, our scars, our failures
Protects us from all threats,
And lets us see each other
From his perspective.
 
Today, I say, "I love you,"
Fourteen years  later,
I mean in the depths of who I am--
Much more than emotion,
An intentional intuitive choice.
 
Stan Sanford
Valentine's Day 2013