Monday Musings: A Wish

Goldenrod, kitchen table bouquet

May the sun bring you new energy by day,

May the moon softly restore you by night,

May the rain wash away your worries,

May the breeze blow new strength into your being.

— Apache Blessing

A wish for you on this Monday...and every day.

Flowering Fridays: On Blooming Fully

Mums from grocery store, kitchen table, new house

One of the things I love about flowers is there is such a sense of exuberant abandon when they open.

It's like they are saying a hearty "YES!" to life and to what is being called forth from them.

We are settling into our new place, and I feel like after months of shedding petals and pruning, I'm opening to bloom again.

Unlike this flower, my petals are not yet fully open, but I feel that instinctual pull to surrending to the bloom that is forming.

I'm not sure about the size or shape of the bloom that's opening, but I know it will be uniquely mine and, I hope, it will be exuberant in its allowing the fullness to emerge.

I'm excited to see what unfolds.

Tell me, what's blooming within you this week?

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Flowering Fridays is a weekly look at flowers through the lens of what they might teach us about flowering fully in our life. Past editions are here.

A Thing of Beauty is a Joy Forever: On "Bright Star"

If you haven't seen this visual feast of poetry, you should.

And if you feeling full of love (or lovelorn), artful, crafty with a needle or ripe with poetry, then you really, really should.

Let's see....a movie about a poet and poetry....some stunningly beautiful shots of flowers and butterflies...about the true life story of star-crossed lovers (poet John Keats and his next-door neighbor Fanny Brawne)...amazing costumes...set in 1800s England...

{{{swoon}}}

Oh, I loved it. I really, really did.

(Even though I do agree with some of the criticisms. I still loved it.)

"Bright Star" had some of the most stunning visuals I'd seen in a movie in a long time.

It helped that some of the most beautiful moments had to do with flowers.

And butterflies.

And it helped that there was so much poetry in the movie.

I haven't really thought about Keats since college English classes. But Bright Star reminded me of his love of beauty and the depth of his words.

Some favorite quotes by John Keats:

A thing of beauty is a joy forever: its loveliness increases; it will never pass into nothingness.

'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,' - that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

Do you not see how necessary a world of pains and troubles is to school an intelligence and make it a soul?

What the imagination seizes as beauty must be truth.

The poetry of the earth is never dead.

I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart's affections, and the truth of imagination.

His words are romantic, and deep and true.

Here is the trailer for the movie:

(Direct link to trailer here)

And part of the lovely butterfly scene:

(Direct link to butterfly scene here)

Tell me, what thing of beauty is bringing joy to your world today?

Note: All images from www.brightstar-movie.com