Category: sacred poetry

Review by Anita Neilson

Letters to My Oldest Friend
by Janavi Held (Goodreads Author)

62048552

Anita Neilson‘s review

Nov 04, 2017
This is simply glorious. The words flow gently across the page in a waterfall of despair and hope, grief and faith, pain and joy. Together with beautifully crafted photographs of the natural world, it is a wonderful, precious undertaking. The poems will resonate strongly with anyone afflicted by a chronic illness or spiritual malaise. Quite breathtakingly haunting in their longing for God. The pull between enjoying the delights of this Earth and the soul crying for greater meaning is much in evidence. For example, in the poem “Eternity”, the poet says, “in this world of change I am longing for You yet I am drawn again and again to the shiny fortunes of this shallow world.” This reduced me to tears, so near was it to my experience of life. These are the sweetest, most poetic, most haunting of verses, to be savoured again and again. Buy a copy and keep it close to you, so that each time you feel sorry for yourself, or angry at someone (even God), open it and read a verse or two. Your spirits will be lifted!
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by Letters

Memory

 

I’ve walked so far
and gotten nowhere.
I contain endless memories
yet I own nothing.

My heart knows
the falling out
the falling down
the falling away

it remembers breaking
and dreams of ascending
and the endless labors
which daily life is famous for.

Titanic, lying memories
forfeiting time
lay in shards
at my feet.

My eyes clarify
without the nescience
of those terrestrial daydreams
and an ancient aria

I forgot to look for
shouts louder now
from the inside
of my temporary heart.

Janavi Held © 2017

The ePub of my book is now available:
https://itunes.apple.com/…/letters-to-my-olde…/id1273048675…

Softcover & Hardcover available on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Letters-Oldest-Friend-J…/…/0986240338

Shattered Time

by Letters

The Land

The land-
she does not
know ownership
nor boundaries
languages
nor skin
moving where she will
inside or out
of our impositions
she takes
the sun
from all corners
and the rain
from all directions.

~ Janavi Held © 2017

ice and humming bird

by Letters

Time Unhinged

Video with spoken poetry below


Hope

 

Time Unhinged

Dreamt of exterminated images,
and forgotten doubts,
of unhinged time
with the hollow

of silent bones
thundering
in the wake of restless flowers.
Blinded by

a vigilant morning
I enter the mists of loneliness
seeking laughter and daydreams
(to counter the emptiness)

too long for counting
these days
press down
on my chest

cementing the architecture
of my sad inheritance.
I establish hope
burying her under

the obliging tree
in my back yard.

 

by Letters

Flooding

Flooding. jpgThe Sky in the heart.

Flooding

Within the
shadowy waters
of illusion
I built thick
castle walls
sunken deep
in those hazy waters
my heart froze
and slept for eons.
Awakened from this
deep sleep of ignorance
by a flood of
Your liberating
monsoon rain
You’ve opened the sky
in my heart
and the
walls of my fortress
are a sunken wreck
I have floated
to the surface
waves
crushed my body
as I rose You
carefully collected
all the lost parts
and knitted me
together with
Your lovely hands
saturated with
eternal love.

~ Janavi Held © 2017

by Letters