Download or read book Poetic Stories About the People of the Sun and of the Soul written by Michael Washington and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2011-05-04 with total page 86 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the army, I often wrote letters for my fellow comrades for a price. They would tell me the story and I would put them in words. It was a good hustle for me to make a little extra money. I would write poems for their ladies or wives for special occasions. You know I liked doing it but I never did make copies to keep for myself. Now, the education system was a very pleasant experience until about the sixth grade for me when I learned that black people were slaves to white people in our social studies classes. That was a defining moment for my educational experience because of the way it was taught. It really threw me for a loop as I went home crying to my mother. But she explained to me that the truth, if you will seek, you will find, and that will make you free. But from then on, I lost some faith in the American education system. As I learned later in life, it was all based upon the theory of white supremacy. For the facts that lead to truth were purposely left out of the mix to deprive black people of their righteous place in history and robbed white people of their truth in history. The school system was one of the two major vehicles by which the white people claimed themselves as superior and the black people as inferior. The other was religion, and together as a double edge sword, they still continue to put enmity between the different peoples and cultures of the world. I did not give up on my learning experience and started to read other materials such as magazines, comics, and biographies of great men of color, especially sports figures. But the number one thing that I used to learn how to read better was the sports page of the L.A. Times. I would read that section from front page to back page every morning before school. But in school, poetry was my most favored reading. I liked the rythming of words as well as the message. I think it was related to another love of mine as a child and that was music and dancing. It didn’t take long for me memorize the lyrics of a song as we danced along, singing aloud, as if we were endowed, with a gift from heaven above, with that special kind of love. That was the ultimate fun as a young man growing up to meet the girls. To write little poems to your girlfriends was what I liked most. The poetry of greeting cards was my cup of tea after my education experience on our family festivities and celebrations. I would add my own poems to the cards on these occasions. The family and friends always seemed to like them so very much, always complimenting and encouraging me to write more. But I did not pursue poetry much as I continued my quest for facts in pursuit of truth. When my marriage ended in divorce in the early 1980s, it was music and poetry that brought joy and peace within. That’s when my writing of poetry increased and my perspective about other things expanded. As a single man again, it was very interesting living the single life. Now, I have been married for 18 years, living the family life called the American dream with grand children and all the wrappings and trappings that go with it. But I don’t mind one little bit because most of us should be graceful for the material life this land has produced despite its inequities. For the horizon does not look as favorable for our future generations that must cope with the mess we have left for them in the physical, mental, and spiritual planes of life.
Download or read book Crazy Brave written by Joy Harjo and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2012-07-09 with total page 173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A memoir from the Native American poet describes her youth with an abusive stepfather, becoming a single teen mom, and how she struggled to finally find inner peace and her creative voice.
Download or read book A Brave and Startling Truth written by Maya Angelou and published by Random House (NY). This book was released on 1995 with total page 42 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First read by Maya Angelou at the 50th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations, this wise and moving poem will inspire readers with its memorable message of hope for humanity.
Download or read book The Essential Rumi written by Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmī (Maulana) and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rumi the Persian poet is widely acknowledged as being the greatest Sufi mystic of his age. He was the founder of the brotherhood of the Whirling Dervishes. This is a collection of his poetry.
Download or read book 101 Hymn Stories written by Kenneth W. Osbeck and published by Kregel Publications. This book was released on 1901 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Hymn singing reflects a congregation's spiritual vitality and their response to God's grace.
Download or read book Why I Wake Early written by Mary Oliver and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2005-04-15 with total page 92 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The forty-seven new works in this volume include poems on crickets, toads, trout lilies, black snakes, goldenrod, bears, greeting the morning, watching the deer, and, finally, lingering in happiness. Each poem is imbued with the extraordinary perceptions of a poet who considers the everyday in our lives and the natural world around us and finds a multitude of reasons to wake early.
Download or read book In the Presence of the Sun written by N. Scott Momaday and published by UNM Press. This book was released on 2013-02-15 with total page 189 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In the Presence of the Sun presents 30 years of selected works by [N. Scott] Momaday, the well-known Southwest Native American novelist. His unadorned poetry, which recounts fables and rituals of the Kiowa nation, conveys the deep sense of place of the Native American oral tradition. Here are dream-songs about animals (bear, bison, terrapin) and life away from urban alienation, an imagined re-creation based on Billy the Kid, prose poems about Plains Shields (and a fascinating discussion of their background), and new poems that utilize primary colors ('forms of the earth') to express instinctive continuities of a pre-Columbian vision."--Library Journal "The strong, spare beauty of In the Presence of the Sun is compelling evidence that Scott Momaday is one of the most versatile and distinguished artists in America today."--Peter Matthiessen ". . . the images, the voices, the people are shadowy, elusive, burning with invention, like flames against a dark sky. For behind them is always the artist-author himself . . . a man with a sacred investiture. Strong medicine, strong art indeed."--The New York Times Book Review
Download or read book The Prophet written by Kahlil Gibran and published by Diamond Pocket Books Pvt Ltd. This book was released on 2020-08-20 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A book of poetic essays written in English, Kahlil Gibran's The Prophet is full of religious inspirations. With the twelve illustrations drawn by the author himself, the book took more than eleven years to be formulated and perfected and is Gibran's best-known work. It represents the height of his literary career as he came to be noted as ‘the Bard of Washington Street.’ Captivating and vivified with feeling, The Prophet has been translated into forty languages throughout the world, and is considered the most widely read book of the twentieth century. Its first edition of 1300 copies sold out within a month.
Download or read book Songs of the Soul written by Paramhansa Yogananda and published by . This book was released on 2024-12 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Original Writings of Paramhansa Yogananda Paramhansa Yogananda is best known for his Autobiography of a Yogi, a book that he said the Lord Himself commissioned him to write, in response to a silent call among many souls for a "practical religion" that would enable them to know the Divinity that dwells in their own hearts and souls. Those who met Yogananda were overwhelmed by the magnetic power of his love. Saints and sages recognized him as one of their own. Sri Anandamoy Ma, Ramana Maharshi, Sri Rama Yogi, and Mahatma Gandhi-these and many other great souls perceived in him an avatar, God incarnated with the power to redeem not only a few close disciples but a vast flock who would be transformed by his divine ray. "As a bright light shining in the midst of darkness, so was Yogananda's presence in this world. Such a great soul comes on earth only rarely, when there is a real need among men." - The Shankaracharya of Kanchipuram, spiritual leader of millions of Hindus. Though divinely tasked with bringing a practical teaching, Yogananda preferred to express his wisdom not in dry intellectual terms but as pure, expansive feeling. To drink his poetry is to be drawn into the web of his boundless, childlike love. Nor was his vision limited to this earthly plane - in one moment his Songs of the Soul invite us to join him as he plays among the stars with his Cosmic Beloved. Then they call us to discover that portion of our own hearts that is eternally one with the Nearest and Dearest. Like his famous Whispers From Eternity, this volume is a bubbling, singing wellspring of spiritual healing that we can bring with us everywhere. (Also included is the addition of five poems not included in the original, 1923 edition.)
Download or read book When You Thought I Wasn t Looking written by Mary Korzan and published by Andrews McMeel Publishing. This book was released on 2004-03 with total page 60 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mary Rita Schilke Korzan wrote a poem to her mother 24 years ago, thanking her for all she had done as a mother, friend, and role model. She gave the poem to her mother and, a few months later, offered it as a tribute when Mary and her husband were married. So many wedding guests asked for a copy that Mary included one in her thank-you notes.Then began the strange and heartwarming journey of Mary's poem to her mom. Friends passed it on to those they knew. A minister in her hometown couldn't recall who gave it to him, but he included the by-then "anonymously written" poem in his book about loving others. Another author picked it up from there for her compilation of heartfelt works, and Mary finally noticed her poem, now listed as "Author Unknown," in A Fourth Course of Chicken Soup for the Soul, which her husband and children gave her as a Mother's Day gift.With this new book, readers have the chance to experience When You Thought I Wasn't Looking in its entirety and from its creator. This is the special kind of book that reminds us that sometimes the little things we do "just because" mean more to someone than we can ever know. Those little things teach love, compassion, and understanding. In other words, they're priceless. This sweet gift book brings that lesson home to the heart.
Download or read book The Invitation written by Oriah Mountain Dreamer and published by HarperCollins UK. This book was released on 2000 with total page 147 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cult bestseller The Invitation is more than just a poem. It is a profound invitation to a life that is more fulfilling and passionate, with greater integrity. This book is a word-of-mouth sensation, whose truths have resonated with people all over the world, and is now reissued with a beautiful new cover design.
Download or read book The Rime of the Ancient Mariner written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge and published by . This book was released on 1900 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Leaves of Grass written by Walt Whitman and published by . This book was released on 1872 with total page 520 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A Bookshop in Algiers written by Kaouther Adimi and published by Serpent's Tail. This book was released on 2021-05-20 with total page 140 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'A beautiful little novel about books, history, ambition and the importance of literature.' Nick Hornby 'Truly potent ... Adimi confronts us with episodes that are simply never spoken of in France' The New York Times Book Review In 1936, a young dreamer named Edmond Charlot opened a modest bookshop in Algiers. Once the heart of Algerian cultural life, where Camus launched his first book and the Free French printed propaganda during the war, Charlot's beloved bookshop has been closed for decades, living on as a government lending library. Now it is to be shuttered forever. But as a young man named Ryad empties it of its books, he begins to understand that a bookshop can be much more than just a shop that sells books. A Bookshop in Algiers charts the changing fortunes of Charlot's bookshop through the political drama of Algeria's turbulent twentieth century of war, revolution and independence. It is a moving celebration of books, bookshops and of those who dare to dream.
Download or read book In the Presence of Absence written by Mahmoud Darwish and published by Archipelago. This book was released on 2012-02-29 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the 2012 National Translation Award “What Sinan [Antoon] has done with In the Presence of Absence is a kind of miraculous work of dedication and love. Reading this volume is sheer enjoyment and sublimity.” —Saadi Yousef “There are two maps of Palestine that politicians will never manage to forfeit: the one kept in the memories of Palestinian refugees, and that which is drawn by Darwish’s poetry.” —Anton Shammas One of the most transcendent poets of his generation, Darwish composed this remarkable elegy at the apex of his creativity, but with the full knowledge that his death was imminent. Thinking it might be his final work, he summoned all his poetic genius to create a luminous work that defies categorization. In stunning language, Darwish’s self-elegy inhabits a rare space where opposites bleed and blend into each other. Prose and poetry, life and death, home and exile are all sung by the poet and his other. On the threshold of im/mortality, the poet looks back at his own existence, intertwined with that of his people. Through these lyrical meditations on love, longing, Palestine, history, friendship, family, and the ongoing conversation between life and death, the poet bids himself and his readers a poignant farewell.
Download or read book The Pleasures of the Damned written by Charles Bukowski and published by Canongate Books. This book was released on 2012-03-29 with total page 529 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Pleasures of the Damned is a selection of the best poetry from America's most iconic and imitated poet, Charles Bukowski. Celebrating the full range of the poet's extraordinary sensibility and his uncompromising linguistic brilliance, these poems cover a lifetime of experience, from his renegade early work to never-before-collected poems penned during the final days before his death. Selected by John Martin, Bukowski's long-time editor and the publisher of the legendary Black Sparrow Press, this stands as what Martin calls 'the best of the best of Bukowski'.
Download or read book A City Full of Stories written by Ashok Subramanian and published by . This book was released on 2021-01-03 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A City Full of Stories is a collection of short fiction stories, divided into three volumes. All stories bring to life the magical cities of Mumbai and adjoining Thane. Hence the name 'A City Full of Stories'. Volume 1 contains 12 short stories. The 12 short stories bring out emotions, events and thoughts that are bound to tie the reader on how urban life goes about. Right from a street dog to a coconut seller, the characters etch a short but sharp impression in the reader's mind. There are also stories about how a typical urban mind works - the confusion, chaos and clarity - a new way of story telling called 'thought fiction'. Volume 2 contains 4 medium length stories. Each story is as contrasting as possible. One is the journal of an urban office goer - switching jobs and juggling personal issues. Another story is about a rag picker, but it also the untold story about the Mumbai Marathon and the precious water that we all take for granted. The third story is about three young boys who make it big, in their own way. It is also a story of simple ingenuity of migrants in the city of Mumbai. The final story is that of a young healthcare worker, who struggles with the dilemma of ethics and finance in her job during COVID19 times. Volume 3 contains a novella - 'CUPID OVER COFFEE'. The story unravels two propositions of love, by two different men - Flight Lieutenant Manoj Bisht and Anand Ramakrishnan, a Mumbai based IT professional, to the protagonist Ananya Bhattacharya, in contrasting styles - more importantly, a decade apart. The story spans across a decade of Ananya's life, her growth, struggles and her response to both the propositions, all over different forms of coffee. The stories are bound to bring the reader a range of emotions and thoughts connecting to the characters' lives. The narratives are also contrasting as can be. Join the author in exploring a cocktail of simplicity and depth of Mumbai's stories. Don't forget to read the Author's Notes which reveal the secret sauce at the end of each story.
