I vie with my own gut feeling that your change is constant and not so sudden for it was foretold in your mind long ago and out by your hand. The words dance upon the page just as brightly as before but with purpose and determination. This, I see, with my eye and this, I feel, by my heart to be so.
Amor

The chill is in the quill of reading your verse where it alights to dance before your eyes.

So deep and authentic....in blindess you may find other more fortunate and welcome options...chance can be quite deliberate, and amazing...Happy New Year...



anita

I just want to read what you write. Your powerful pen continually continues to startle and delight. Sad in some ways and glad in others. Bless you, my friend that you will find again the wings beneath you wings. Hugs, Liz

excellent write
Awesome and profound
Love & peace be with you

William

Shelia, this truly is a wonderfully stated emotional poem. The line about shedding your skin has a striking feeling of one moving away from the old toward destiny and perhaps the unknown. Excellent write!

the broken coil is such an image that sticks. things do have stages and stumbling is only to make you realize how great it is to stand straight....i'd like to think..........great writing from the heart. Morgan

Sheila, the only way now, is UP! Look at life with positive thoughts and you will be uplifted toward your true destiny! This is an outstanding poem, that all can relate to. Excellent work!

Peace, love and light,
Amber

It seems shedding skin is a lifelong ritual. Well penned and honest.

"Connecting" with the new you, "dissecting"... you are describing some powerful actions, Sheila. And, although I can easily relate to the state of the mind described in the last lines, I don't think that we are so blind. We have gained insight.

Axilea

Sheila you have penned the sentiments of so many, yet so personally.
Well done.
Janna

So beautifully, thoughtfully inspired, Sheila, with clarion diction that resounds like a bell. This is weighty work which is worth all the blood, sweat and tears of having completed it. It feels like a birthing to me, rather than a demise - but one that is as if coming through an earthquake or fleeing a volcano. Yes, we can thankfully feel ourselves to be cast up on that other, safer shore sometimes, but how we got there we know not. Battle the cross-current but rest in the flow of a new and rising tide. You are strong - this writing shows it. xx

This can't be for real. No bloke could be such to such a beaut!
However, life is full of unnecessary pain.
NO WAY can you crumble, or stumble. Mayhap like a caterpillar life moves on to something more beautiful, whilst it takes time-out in the cocoon, so will yours. Just fly pretty butterfly, fly in to the exciting unknown.

Blimey, you'll be finer fine, just remain so divine. And fly! xx

I think life consists of many stumbling blocks..faith gives strength to take them one step at a time~ beautiful work~
Blessings,
Christine

Wonderful poem speaking through an awakened voice with such humility and tenderness!
Wonderful deeply human surrender into what seems to me some rite of passage to the future.
I relate to your poem and am grateful to read such a poignant piece as you show us a bit of this new path that I betcha will be just wonderful.
Christine

I can relate to this first hand Sheilafriend. Been down the road several times in my life. Seasons of change are never comfortable, but they are necessary. Like cutting back the rose bushes, pretty much down to nubs, as it allows for another, more verdant, season of growth. People are the same in many respects. There is a natural ebb and flow to everything in life, especially our lives.

Certainly (remembering my own season) the creative wave you were riding, and everything that poured through you, that you actually made tangible, being loved and cared for, being focused and determined, was a kind of joyous bliss at times that anyone would want to last forever. Alas ...

There are many paths to walk; some take you where you think you want to go, and then there's that one path that takes you where you're supposed to be. 2010 was a time of transition and loss for me. What I learned personally through the non-stop barrage was to relax and change my focus because there was nothing I could do to shorten the season, or lessen its intensity, and there was another kind of wisdom that God wanted me to glean; and son-of-a-gun if it wasn't true.

Your wonderful poem is telling about how your mind sums everything up [presently] but there are the images you insert [throughout] of wings and flying and touching down again that are telling of a weary heart that remains positive. Blessings of peace and wisdom 2 U ... richard

Oh my goodness, Sheila, this is certainly packed with emotion...the letting go, the pain, the anguish, the hand reaching. "Under the drift I fight and toil" is my favorite line, but the entire piece packs a wallop to the heart. Intense write! ~Hugs, Elizabeth

There will always be obstacles...for no one's path is clear and smooth...but the journey is worth all the knocks and dings! Keep on keepin' on, Sheila! Very thought-provoking writing, my friend....very much enjoyed!

Hugs,
Anna

Quite powerful - I think we all often blindly stumble.

"through the sorrow, through the drift-a hand extended" this beautiful line is the soul of your wonderful poem. Through all the dark clouds and darkness we can only hope that someone will always reach out a hand to us. Beautiful work you have shared with us Shiela.
fee

Your words reach deeply into my whole being; they make me "feel" what you express because I am familiar with what you share via your verses here, Sheila. Thank you for this gift. Love and best wishes to you,

Regis

Know the feeling!!

You have done a great job of describing the mixed feelings and tendency to grab at straws that come with renewed discovery that life is an up and down battle. Confusion and weariness are inevitable! Constant change makes it hard-to-impossible to stay on a even keel. [sigh]

Great that you have talent, wisdom, and insight on your side!

Onward & upward !

<3 Phyllis <3

You are a spiritual miner, Sheila,
delving and probing, digging out
values and decisions for fresh appraisal..
you set me wondering if there are, in fact,
any wrong paths and i feel there aren't..
only ones that don't suit us as individuals
or suit our particular way in the world.
i'm saving this.

John

Sheila, a path the majority of humankind has trodden or will trod -- before we have a grip with reality and the important things in life, it is half over -- you stumble where we too have stumbled -- so we are all sort of in your corner as you stumble, metaphorically or in fact -- I bid you love and peace my dear friend -- Jon Michel

Watta lament, Sheila. Every line is building into the next one and taken all together you are, yes indeed, into the future stumbling. I hope this isn't fer real, but if'n it is, grab some fortitude, a handful of grit, and start kicking high, you'll march out of the doldrums. You betcha.