"West Texas Waltz"

He was a honky tonk hero

She was the West Texas Rose

He had his hands clenched in hatred

She made the sweet flowers grow.

They met on a Saturday evening

At a place called the "Last Chance Saloon"

Her hand in his stopped the trembling

When he laughed as they danced

 cross the room.

The jukebox was playing a beautiful song

A tune called the "West Texas Waltz"

And it seemed like the whole world 

was dancing along

With the music controlling it all.

Away, come away from that window

Come lay down beside me awhile

You know I stepped out of the shadows

To walk in the Warmth of your Smile.

Nobody knows me like you do

You changed me and made me a man

I gave up the life of an outlaw

The day that you gave me your hand.

 He was a honky tonk hero

She was the West Texas Rose

They met on a Saturday evening

 She made the sweet flowers grow.  

~ Billy Joe Shaver
U.S.A.


~ Beannaichte'
  20 November, 2021

@beannaichte.twitter.com  

 

 

"Tiny Beautiful Things"

              

               Don't lament so much about how your career is going to turn out.  You don't have a career.  You have a life.  Do the work.  Keep the Faith.  Be true blue.  You are a writer because you write. Keep writing and quit your complaining.  Your book has a birthday.  You don't know what it is yet.
              You cannot convince people to love you.  This is an absolute rule.  No one will ever give you love because you want him or her to give it.  Real Love moves freely in both directions.  Don't waste your time on anything else.
              Most things will be okay eventually, but not everything will be.  Sometimes you'll put up a good fight and lose.  Sometimes you'll hold on really hard and realize there is no choice but to let go.  Acceptance is a small, quiet room.
              Your assumptions about the lives of others are in direct relationship to your naive pomposity.  Many people you believe to be rich are not rich.  Many people you think have it easy worked hard for what they got.  Many people who seem to be gliding right along have suffered and are suffering.  Many people who appear to be olde and stupidly saddled down with kids and cars and houses were once every bit as hip and pompous as you.
              When you meet a man in the doorway of a Mexican restaurant who later kisses you while explaining that the kiss doesn't "mean anything" because, much as he likes you, he is not interested in having a relationship with you or anyone right now, just laugh and kiss him back.  Your daughter will have his sense of humour.  Your son will have his eyes.
              The useless days will add up to something. The horrible waitress jobs.  The hours writing in your journal.  The long meandering walks.  The hours reading poetry and story collections and novels and  dead people's diaries and wondering about sex and God and whether you should shave under your arms or not.  These things are your becoming.
              One Christmas at the very beginning of your twenties when your mother gives you a warm coat that she saved for months to buy, don't look at her skeptically after she tells you she thought the coat was perfect for you.  Don't hold it up and say it's longer than you like your coats to be and too puffy and possibly even too warm.  Your mother will be dead by spring.  That coat will be the last gift she gave you.  You will regret the small thing you didn't say for the rest of your life.
              Say, "Thank You".

     ~ From "Tiny Beautiful Things,"

by Cheryl Strayed

~ Beannaichte'

5 May, 2020

@beannaichte.twitter.com

"Mother God"

 

God to me

Is my dark-haired Mother,

Stroking my forehead

As she lullabies me to sleep.

My Mother is the Earth

And all her Creatures,

The Web that brings us into Relationship

With one another.

God to me

Is the Mother

Who Spills her Essence into the World,

Creating and Calling us to Create

From the wombs of our Being. 

God to me

Is the Mother 

Whose Voice was Drowned out

For most of History,

And yet,

I find her in my Deepest Wisdom,

Alone, I feel her Touch

Upon my brow,

Mothering me still,

Mothering us all.

~Lana Dalberg

~Beannaichte'

22 November, 2013

@beannaichte.twitter.com    

"The Journey"

One day 
you finally knew

what you had to do, and began

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice-

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

"Mend my life!"

each voice cried.

But you didn't stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations,

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen branches and stones.

But little by little

as you left their voices behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of the clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognised as your own,

that kept you company

as you stode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing I could do-

determined to save

the only Life I could save.

~Mary Oliver

~Beannaichte'
26 August, 2013

@beannaichte.twitter.com