Tag: literary quotes

Literary Wisdom: Sunflowers and Light

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You Are One of the Lights

I am thinking about participating in National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo) this year. I participated from 2016-2019, but I missed the last couple of years because the thought of blogging daily during the height of the pandemic was overwhelming. Now, I feel like I might need the daily distraction of Pics and Posts to help me stay sane. I’ll spend the next couple of days figuring out a strategy (and topics), and we’ll see how life goes. I already missed Day 1, so if I decide to post every day, I will end on December 1 instead of November 30. 

For today, I’m sharing a postcard from my Wildflowers literary sister, Gina B. Her postcard carrying sunflowers and light arrived just when it should have. In this quote from Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897), Dr. Van Helsing enthuses over the work of Mina Murray who transcribes the diaries of Lucy Westenra, Dracula’s first victim. 

Here’s an interesting tidbit: I could not read Dracula. One of my graduate professors suggested the book for my master’s thesis, but I only read a little more than half the book before deciding against including it in my work. I was having very vivid nightmares associated with the characters and plot and simply could not allow myself to be tortured any longer. Despite the nightmares, there’s no denying the postcard Gina B sent presents a beautiful bit of literary wisdom!

There are darknesses in life and there are lights, and you are one of the lights, the light of all lights.

Postcards That Make a Statement | Literary Wisdom

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Our Best Guides

Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

Who Sent It? Lisa (LisaLaughs) sent this one for a “literary wisdom” swap for the Cup and Chaucer group on swap-bot. I haven’t really participated in swaps since the beginning of the pandemic. I really enjoyed hosting literary postcard swaps, so I’m trying to find time to get back into it. The postcard comes from a set of 100 Jane Austen postcards, From the Desk of Jane Austen, which features quotes from her books and letters. These have been some of my favorite postcards to send, so I am always happy to receive one (back)!

Celebrate the Gift!

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Sunflower Mug

For there is always light,
if only we’re brave enough to see it.
If only we’re brave enough to be it. –Amanda Gorman, “The Hill We Climb”

I mentioned in the Four Promises and a Gift post that my friend Kelli’s gift was the impetus for the blog theme of the week (now two weeks). She dropped off a sunflower-themed care basket filled with sunflower goodies— a sunflower notebook, a sunflower mug with an Amanda Gorman’s quote [above], chamomile tea, raw local honey, and of course, chocolate. I was touched by her thoughtfulness, but what moved me to tears was the beautiful note she included which expressed admiration and appreciation for the gifts of beauty and hope I share with the world despite the “many storms of loss” I have weathered.

The gift of Kelli’s words reminded me that what I do matters to others. I’m out here tossing beauty about because it’s what I need to do for own my sanity and healing, not paying [much] attention to its impact. Kelli’s words—written and verbal—beckoned me to appreciate and celebrate my gifts and more importantly the gift of who I am in spite of—and maybe because of—what I’ve been through.

Those losses Kelli referred to in her note concretized the reality that life is fragile, and there are no guarantees. I don’t have to be in this world at all, let alone be here sharing love and light and beauty. So, it’s not that I don’t see the value of my gifts. It’s that I am clear about Who gave me these gifts. I thank God for life and for using me to light up life for others. I thank God for the gift of me.

We all have gifts. We all have that little something in us–a spark–that propels us to do small things, big things, in-between things that lighten, gladden, and stir the hearts of others. It is part of what makes life colorful, beautiful, and meaningful.

I hope you know you are a gift, a treasure. You bless, inspire, and move others just by being who you are. Celebrate that and the gifts your presence bring to the world.

Celebrate the gift of you!

Kelli gift

Let’s Make Lists: Seven Bits of Wisdom from Seven Favorite Books

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“Lavender in Old Book,” Photo by Ekaterina Antonova

If you haven’t been around long enough to notice, I love, love, love books and, therefore, words and quotes. When people ask “What’s your favorite book?,” I hand them a 10-page list of books (slight exaggeration). And quotes? Who can select a single favorite? “Not I,” said the rabbit [the rabbit is me].

“Old Books,” Photo by Oksana Nazarchuk

So, for today’s list—and #WednesdayWisdom—I’m sharing seven life-changing quotes from seven of my favorite books. The selection is limited and random and in no way represents a privileging or prioritizing of other works over others. If I were to list all the quotes and all the books, this blog would be about books and quotes, not pics and posts.

So here’s my list of quotes. Maybe, they’ll change your life too.

“The Shepherd laughed too. “I love doing preposterous things,” he replied. “Why, I don’t know anything more exhilarating and delightful than turning weakness into strength, and fear into faith, and that which has been marred into perfection.’ ― Hannah Hurnard, Hinds Feet on High Places

There must be always remaining in every life, some place for the singing of angels, some place for that which in itself is breathless and beautiful.―Howard Thurman, Meditations of the Heart

“The life of faith is not a life of mounting up with wings, but a life of walking and not fainting.”―Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest

“Literary Paris,” from Obvious State

Whatever happens around you, don’t take it personally… Nothing other people do is because of you. It is because of themselves.”―Don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements

You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care, nor your nights without a want and a grief, but rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound. ― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

Evil can be undone, but it cannot ‘develop’ into good. Time does not heal it. The spell must be unwound, bit by bit, ‘with backward mutters of dissevering power’ – or else not. ―C. S. Lewis, The Great Divorce

You wanna fly, you got to give up the sh*t that weighs you down. ―Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon

books1

Like any other list, it would be easy for me to go waaaaaay overboard, but I’m trying to practice what I preach to my students. Sometimes, less is more.

What’s your favorite quote? Are any of these a new fav?

About the Images: Each postcard in this post was for bookish swaps on swap-bot. Aren’t they fabulous?

“In This Here Place…”

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Emilio Cruz. Figurative Composition #7, 1965, oil on canvas. Smithsonian American Art Museum. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. David K. Anderson, Martha Jackson Memorial Collection, 1980.137.21

We are nearing the end of discussion of Toni Morrison’s Beloved in one of my classes. My favorite part of the novel (and perhaps the reason I love it so much) is the sermon Baby Suggs, holy delivers in the Clearing. Instead of an actual Bible verse, love is her text. To those newly loosed [one way or another] from the chains and nightmare of slavery it is a reminder of their humanity and a call to release the atrocities of the past and imagine a new reality. After exorcising their demons through dance, laughter, and tears, Baby Suggs delivers a love letter to their beautiful souls. For me, this is the most powerful part of the book:

In this here place, we flesh; flesh that weeps, laughs; flesh that dances on bare feet in grass. Love it. Love it hard. Yonder they do not love your flesh. They despise it. They don’t love your eyes; they’d just as soon pick em out. No more do they love the skin on your back. Yonder they flay it. And O my people they do not love your hands. Those they only use, tie, bind, chop off and leave empty. Love your hands! Love them. Raise them up and kiss them. Touch others with them, pat them together, stroke them on your face ’cause they don’t love that either. You got to love it, you! And no, they ain’t in love with your mouth. Yonder, out there, they will see it broken and break it again. What you say out of it they will not heed. What you scream from it they do not hear. What you put into it to nourish your body they will snatch away and give you leavins instead. No, they don’t love your mouth. You got to love it. This is flesh I’m talking about here. Flesh that needs to be loved. Feet that need to rest and to dance; backs that need support; shoulders that need arms, strong arms I’m telling you. And O my people, out yonder, hear me, they do not love your neck unnoosed and straight. So love your neck; put a hand on it, grace it, stroke it and hold it up. And all your inside parts that they’d just as soon slop for hogs, you got to love them. The dark, dark liver–love it, love it and the beat and beating heart, love that too. More than eyes or feet. More than lungs that have yet to draw free air. More than your life-holding womb and your life-giving private parts, hear me now, love your heart. For this is the prize.  –Toni Morrison, Beloved

I cannot locate a quality clip of Beah Richard’s phenomenal [understatement] performance of the second part [above] of Baby Sugg’s sermon, but here’s the first part.

About the Image: The artwork featured above is the work of Emilio Cruz, an African American artist of Cuban descent. You can see more of his work by clicking the link. It is one of the postcards in Paintings by African-Americans from the collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.