Shinedown ~ Burning Bright

This is a song I just heard from my new CD. I really like it.

The Heart

Lock it up,

Keep it close

Bar the door

But keep the window open.

Let it live

It needs air

It is easily broken

But protect it from harm

It’s a gentle thing

Yet it can be cold

It’s a giving thing

But it can be the cruelest of all.

It keeps a goal

It takes it’s time

It keeps a beat

But it’s quick to fall.

It moves life

Through our veins

It’s a part of us

But it has a mind of its own.

A hopeless romantic,

A match-maker,

A bubbly little thing

But it gives itself away without thinking twice.

It is the heart

Our hearts

My heart

But it’s really all the same.

Our hearts bind us

And bleeds and beats

And cries and laughs

But they can also be so indifferent.

It will drive you mad

To try and figure it out

It gives life a purpose

But you can’t predict its actions.

It’s more than just an organ

A pump of the body

It can make you insane

But its joys are incomparable.

So keep your heart close

Protect is from itself

But once it decides to fall

You’re going down with it.

The Caterpillar's Wife

Mary crawled up the trunk of the maple tree, she was feeling very flustered today. Actually she felt flustered a lot of the time, but it wasn’t her fault, no, no. Her mother had told her there would come a time when she would feel ugly. At the time she couldn’t image being and feeling ugly at the same time, but the time had come. She felt slow and heavy; all she wanted to do was sleep and eat. It meant only one thing: the change was coming.

Soon her entire existence would be altered. Her lifestyle, the way her body looked and functioned would change, she would be able to fly. A daunting a thought as that might be she had thought there would be someone to support her. Someone to talk her through this tough time; that someone was Carl.

He had been charming and sweet…for the first five minutes.

Now he ate and slept just as much, nay, more than even she did!

She tried to speak to him about it, but he would always shush her. Last time, he said it was very crass of her to even speak of such things. Crass! Crass! They were married! Before she could come up with a descent argument, he had gone back to eating. Indignant; she left to go down to sulk and nibble on the remains of the leaves she and Carl had missed.

As Mary reached the leafy branch that she and Carl had been eating at for the past few days, she took a sip of some dew. Panting from exhaustion she forced her soar feet to crawl to the branch where she had last seen her husband.

“Carl!” she called, “are you still here?”

There was no reply.

Odd, she thought to herself. There were plenty of unfinished leaves and dew on these branches. She couldn’t think of why he would have moved on.

  Maybe he came looking for me, she thought dubiously. No most likely he got eaten by a bird; serves him right for eating out in the open. Oh, well, more for me.

  A few hours later she had just finished off a leaf and was out to find another one when something caught her eye. It was brown, and curled up. Surely it can’t be a leaf! She thought shocked. That would me she was late changing.

Crawling closer to the brown thing she realized it was a chrysalis.

“Carl! How could you!?” She squealed in anger, “of all the selfish things to do!” she scolded the Carl-sized cocoon. “You get to sleep while I’m stuck out here it’s so rude, it’s…it’s – cosmopolitan! That’s what it is! It’s so rude the world, knows it! You just wait until you wake up and I’ll give you a piece of my mind!”

Her Name is Alice ~ Shinedown

I have been listening to this song everyday for the past week. So I figured that sharing this song with all of you would be a good way to start out this lovely, sunny Tuesday.

Her Name is Alice ~ Shinedown

I've been listening to this song a couple times a day for the past week. So I thought sharing it would be a good way to start this lovely, sunny Tuesday!

Inspiration

Fall Semester is finally over, and I’m already starting to dread the Spring Semester, but let’s not think about that. Now that I have the time to write, and I mean truly sit down and just do it and not thinking about anything else, or rushing so that I can get it over with and move on to some sort of assignment, self assigned or otherwise.

The subject according to the subject heading I picked is inspiration. So, I’ll start there, the inspiration for this post is that I just visited my Aunt Christine in the hospital today. Well, she’s not really my aunt, but I’ve adopted her. She's just had brain surgery to have a tumor removed. I watched her going through the past year as she prepared herself physically, mentally and spiritually for this surgery and I think I will take away from this time watching and being with her as a really inspirational rather than a scary experience (though it certainly was). After all of the stress and worry it was good to see her picking at her indigestible hospital food and great us with a tired but sweet smile.

I met my aunt not long after my family moved to California and my Mama and I were looking for a place to grow as writers. We found the Coffee House Writers Group and I was very pleased to join it. Christine was both the leader and organizer of the group and now she has definitely earned the title Fearless leader. She's officially one of the bravest people I've ever met. Forget my veteran Grandfather, cousins and Great Uncle, anyone can get drafted.

So, after I wrote my title (yes, sometimes I write a title before writing a post) I asked myself after I chose my title, (or my title chose me) what inspires me? Who inspires me? But most importantly: what does it or they inspire me to do or be?

 I thought of Christine and her poor head looking like something from a horror or graphic civil war film (which are pretty much the same thing) and Christine’s playful comment that she was going to be trying out for Frankenstein’s Monster’s Wife; although now that I think of it, one would be hard pressed to find someone casting for such a roll during Yuletide…

  She inspires me to be happy, to be brave, to write, to smile, to live, to love and above all to be me, especially during hard times.