inspiration

Where do you belong?

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 13 Comments

Who decides where you fit in?

Walking into a room full of others

feeling like you don’t belong, not one of them.

Severed, the other, a misfit.

Open faces smile, glance your way.

But you have already closed the door

on belonging.

Doors open both ways. Exit this one.

Return again with this knowing

you are not held separate. Proving your worth

was never a requirement. The family of all things*

has been waiting for you.

Take this place, a space saved just for you.

Anywhere in the room will work.

Acceptance comes from inside.

* Acknowledgement to Mary Oliver’s words from her poem “Wild Geese”

© Ali Grimshaw 2016 (photo taken on the Oregon coast.)

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Discover Challenge – Finding Your Place

A Mindful Vacation

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 15 Comments

Between each breath
one, maybe two seconds at most,
a tiny space of nothingness.
My passport can’t get me there.
Driving faster, running harder,
multitasking while eating lunch
working later, doing more…
no closer to my destination.

“Where would you like to travel to?” they ask.

someplace between
inhale
and exhale.

© Ali Grimshaw

Visiting With Chaos

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 14 Comments

Spills splattered the walls.

Counters filled with clutter,

multiple piles creating a new geography in the room.

There is a relief to cleaning it all away.

Everything in order. Repair and replace.

The seduction of a new cycle, sparkling clean.

Free from marks of history.

 

What if we could sit with Chaos

for just a little minute?

Feel the wind in our ears.

Hearing her secrets of cleverness.

Soaking in the learning of this undone space.

Before an opportunity is erased.

A past disinfected before she can author her story

from which the plot differs from

perpetual duplicating.

© Alicia Grimshaw 2016

Chaos – Photo Challenge

 

 

 

 

Dirty Knees

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 9 Comments

image

When she fell

in her pain she was grateful,

to all those along the way who

patiently taught her how to rise to her feet.

showed her how to dust off,

heal the wounds,

start again.

After years of practice

she wasn’t afraid of falling anymore.

Dirty knees were honorable.

© Ali Grimshaw 2016

 

 

 

The Aha

~ Ali Grimshaw ~ 5 Comments

Once balanced on their ends

the squares fall, one nudging the other.

A tumbling of memories,

replaying like a film made from still pictures.

held together by a plot that used to make sense.

Now I hold a new appreciation for the structure

that held them in place for  years. The straining sides

that were keeping order, now dissolved,

layers becoming a ferris wheel of change

arriving as a new shape on the floor.

© Ali Grimshaw