Download or read book Poetry as Spiritual Practice written by Robert McDowell and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2008-07-15 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "[When we read and write poetry,] it is as if a long-settled cloud in our mind suddenly dissipates, and we are divine once again." -- from the Introduction Poetry is the language of devotion in prayer, chant, and song. Reading and writing poetry creates clarity, deepens and expands spiritual inquiry, and cultivates wisdom, compassion, self-confidence, patience, and love. In author Robert McDowell's words, poetry makes you into a tuning fork of the Divine. But poetry has disappeared over the centuries from religious ceremonies, academic curricula, and public discourse. In Poetry as Spiritual Practice, the first inspirational and instructional guide to combine poetry and spirituality, McDowell restores poetry as the natural language of spiritual practice and invites you to recognize poetry as "the pure sound and shape of your spirit." Vividly illustrated with a wide range of poems from all historical eras and poetic traditions, numerous religions and faiths, and McDowell's own and his students' work, Poetry as Spiritual Practice will reintroduce you to the unique pleasure of verse. And meditations throughout will allow you to integrate reading and writing poetry into your spiritual journeys and daily life. Since many of us have long forgotten, or never learned, the mechanics and terminology of poetry -- trochaic feet and tropes trip us up; we can't tell a villanelle from its shorter cousin, rondeau; and a terza rima may as well be a tanka -- this is also an instructional handbook on reading and writing poetry. An engaging guide through the landscape of world poetry, McDowell argues along the way for the many practical benefits of poetic literacy. Making poetry an essential part of daily rituals, aspirations, and intentions will put you on the path to greater meaning, growth, and peace in your life. At once an engaging technical primer, a profound meditation on the relationship between poetry and the Divine, and an inspirational guide for integrating poetry into spiritual practice, Poetry as Spiritual Practice will become a cherished companion.
Download or read book The Dharma of Poetry written by John Brehm and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2021-01-26 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author explores poetry as a spiritual practice with example poems from contemporary and historical poets, particularly as they relate to Buddhism. Includes meditations on poems and writing prompts for readers to experiment with on their own.
Download or read book Poetry As a Spiritual Practice written by Catherine Ghosh and published by . This book was released on 2016-06-20 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this reflective collection of personal essays, poems and meditations, fifty women illuminate the powerful role poetry plays in unleashing their spirits. Juxtaposing the waxing and waning of the moon phases, with cycles of concealing and revealing their own voices, the authors tap into an ancient theme to explore the mystical experience of birthing a poem. What is it about the unique nature of poetry that draws fullness of expression from female hearts?How do poems become conduits to what is most sacred within us?This third book to emerge from the "Journey of the Heart Poetry Project" lifts the veil on these, and other mysterious subjects, surrounding women who spontaneously engage poetry writing as part of their spiritual practice.All proceeds from the book will be donated to a nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering women to express themselves through writing.
Download or read book Everyday Spiritual Practice written by Scott W. Alexander and published by Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations. This book was released on 1999 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Have you wondered, "How do I integrate my heartfelt beliefs into my daily life?" Nearly 40 contributors address this creative dilemma and share their discoveries. Creating a home altar, practicing martial arts, fasting, quilting -- these are just some of the ways they've found to make every day more meaningful and satisfying.
Download or read book How the Light Gets In written by Pat Schneider and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2013-04-25 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "When I begin to write, I open myself and wait. And when I turn toward an inner spiritual awareness, I open myself and wait." With that insight, Pat Schneider invites readers to contemplate their lives and deepest questions through writing. In seventeen concise thematic chapters that include meditations on topics such as fear, freedom, tradition in writing and in religions, forgiveness, joy, social justice, and death, How the Light Gets In gracefully guides readers through the artistic and spiritual questions that life offers to everyone. Praised as a "fuse lighter" by author Julia Cameron and "the wisest teacher of writing I know" by the celebrated writing guru Peter Elbow, Pat Schneider has lived a life of writing and teaching, passion and compassion. With How the Light Gets In, she delves beyond the typical "how-to's" of writing to offer an extended rumination on two inner paths, and how they can run as one. Schneider's book is distinct from the many others in the popular spirituality and creative writing genre by virtue of its approach, using one's lived experience--including the experience of writing--as a springboard for expressing the often ineffable events that define everyday life. Her belief that writing about one's own life leads to greater consciousness, satisfaction, and wisdom energizes the book and carries the reader elegantly through difficult topics. As Schneider writes, "All of us live in relation to mystery, and becoming conscious of that relationship can be a beginning point for a spiritual practice--whether we experience mystery in nature, in ecstatic love, in the eyes of our children, our friends, the animals we love, or in more strange experiences of intuition, synchronicity, or prescience."
Download or read book The Spiritual Poems of Rumi written by Rumi and published by Wellfleet Press. This book was released on 2020-09-15 with total page 131 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Spiritual Poems of Rumi is a beautiful and elegantly illustrated gift book of Rumi's spiritual poems translated by Nader Khalili, geared for readers searching for a stronger spiritual core.
Download or read book Saved by a Poem written by Kim Rosen and published by Hay House, Inc. This book was released on 2009-10-01 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Can someone really be saved by a poem? In Kim Rosen’s book, the answer is a resounding "Yes!" Poetry, the most ancient form of prayer, is a necessary medicine for our times: a companion through difficulty; a guide when we are lost; a salve when we are wounded; and a conduit to an inner source of joy, freedom, and insight. Whether you are a lover of poetry or have yet to discover its power, Rosen offers a new way to experience a poem. She encourages you to feel the poem as you might an affirmation or sacred text, which can align every level of your being. In an uncertain world, Saved by a Poem is an emphatic call to cultivate the ever-renewable resources of the heart. Through poetry, the unspeakable can be spoken, the unendurable endured, and the miraculous shared. Weaving teaching, story, verse, and memoir, Rosen guides you to find a poem that speaks to you so you can take it into your life and become a voice for its wisdom in the world. Inspirational audio download included! Featuring the voices of well-known authors reading a favorite poem and discussing its personal significance: Joan Borysenko, Andrew Harvey, Jane Hirshfield, Marie Howe, Grace Yi-Nan Howe, Robert Holden, Stanley Kunitz, Elizabeth Lesser, Thomas Moore, Christiane Northrup, Cheryl Richardson, Kim Rosen, and Geneen Roth.
Download or read book The Poetics of Adonis and Yves Bonnefoy written by Kareem James Abu-Zeid and published by Lockwood Press. This book was released on 2021-06-15 with total page 171 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the work of two major poets who wrote in the second half of the twentieth century, Yves Bonnefoy of France and the Syrian-born Adonis (born Ali Ahmed Said). In conducting close readings of key moments from their respective poetry, the author illustrates how both of these writers, in their own unique ways, construct poetry as a form of spiritual practice, that is, as a way of transforming both the poet's and the implied reader's ontological, perceptual, and creative relationships with their internal and external worlds.
Download or read book Spiritual Exercise written by Lance Carden and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2019-08-19 with total page 72 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is not just a book about spirituality. It’s a celebration of spirituality as a natural and essential element of self-realization and human progress. Each and every one of these poems is a potential epiphany. The poet holds up spirituality as the ultimate goal of all human endeavor and an advance beyond organic life, which is “a carcass of thought used & abandoned, dust to dust, by all that’s ever truly us.” The highest work of the poet, he says, “is to translate what we blindly see as merely matter back into the Spirit sphere.” This book makes much of prayer, spiritual practice, and especially divine Love: “When we live in Love & it’s in us, the world explodes in loveliness.” Each poem stretches one’s thought towards the divine—and is thus a rewarding Spiritual Exercise.
Download or read book The Poetry of Impermanence Mindfulness and Joy written by John Brehm and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2017-06-06 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over 125 poetic companions, from Basho to Billy Collins, Saigyo to Shakespeare. The Poetry of Impermanence, Mindfulness, and Joy received the Spirituality & Practice Book Award for 50 Best Spiritual Books in 2017 by Spirituality and Practice Website. The poems expertly gathered here offer all that one might hope for in spiritual companionship: wisdom, compassion, peacefulness, good humor, and the ability to both absorb and express the deepest human emotions of grief and joy. The book includes a short essay on “Mindful Reading” and a meditation on sound from editor John Brehm—helping readers approach the poems from an experiential, non-analytical perspective and enter into the mindful reading of poetry as a kind of meditation. The Poetry of Impermanence, Mindfulness, and Joy offers a wide-ranging collection of 129 ancient and modern poems unlike any other anthology on bookshelves today. It uniquely places Buddhist poets like Han Shan, Tu Fu, Saigyo, Ryokan, Basho, Issa, and others alongside modern Western poets one would not expect to find in such a collection—poets like Wallace Stevens, Robert Frost, Elizabeth Bishop, William Stafford, Denise Levertov, Jack Gilbert, Ellen Bass, Billy Collins, and more. What these poems have in common, no matter whether they are explicitly Buddhist, is that all reflect the essential truths the Buddha articulated 2,500 years ago. The book provides an important poetic complement to the many prose books on mindfulness practice—the poems here both reflect and embody the dharma in ways that can’t be matched by other modes of writing. It’s unique features include an introduction that discusses the themes of impermanence, mindfulness, and joy and explores the relationship between them. Biographical notes place the poets in historical context and offer quotes and anecdotes to help readers learn about the poets’ lives.
Download or read book God in the Yard written by L. L. Barkat and published by T. S. Poetry Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through days and nights of L.L. Barkat's year of daily outdoor solitude comes an irresistible voice calling you to spiritual practice. This 12-week course tells a unique story, but it will also invite you to personal growth. You'll find various options for discovery and participation: free writing, writing response, physical and mental play, and blogging (or alternatives).
Download or read book Ascension written by Giovanni Singleton and published by Counterpath Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 95 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Poetry. In this diary of intentionality, the behearer and the beholder approach the world with an attitude of longing—for less: less sorrow, less suffering. Daily practice delivers the speaker to profound meditations on the nature of the self. These poems press against our deepest held questions: what is an I? Where are my borders? What or how am I "with"? "From whom—from what—do we hide?" "This little book of few words is immense in its silences, depths of ambiguity, range of feeling—dark, light, umber, copper, sienna—full of strange inward jottings (graphically adventurous) that echo and dance in a reader's mind. ASCENSION's quiet absences are fully, passionately, present—you can almost hear the music the title suggests, and the loss and wonder that goes with it"—Norman Fischer.
Download or read book Being True to Life written by David Richo and published by Shambhala Publications. This book was released on 2009-12-15 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Psychotherapist David Richo offers a fresh and inspiring approach to personal growth: we can use the process of writing and reading poetry to move toward greater self-understanding and emotional healing. Even if you’ve never written a poem before, you can learn to use poetry to explore your feelings, your relationships, your childhood, your dreams, and more. Richo explains how the creative, intuitive process of making poetry can help us gain access to our deepest truths, leading us to make connections and explore experiences in a new way, beyond the constraints of everyday language. This book offers a range of practical exercises for getting started, as well as guidance on how to read poetry in a way that can be personally transformative. Being True to Life shows us that poetry is not reserved for a few specially talented individuals but is a deeply human activity that anyone can tap into for greater clarity and insight into life’s struggles, beauty, and mysteries.
Download or read book From and for God written by Sitaram Dass and published by . This book was released on 2020-11-30 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From and for God is an intimate and contemplative collection of writings on the spiritual path. Through poetry and prose, Sitaram Dass honors his teacher, Ram Dass, and shares his heart's journey on the path of Love. The author donates 100% of his profits to Hanuman Maui, a 501(c)3 nonprofit with a mission to preserve Ram Dass's legacy on Maui and foster community through the teachings of love, service and devotion. Half of those proceeds are specifically designated for Kripa's service projects through the Sacred Community Project, a program under the direct fiscal sponsorship of Hanuman Maui. Kripa works to lower the barriers of access to contemplative and devotional practices through affordable, free, and donation-based offerings and prison outreach. "In these luminous pages, Sitaram Dass embodies the teachings of his beloved mentor, Ram Dass. The warmth of devotion melts any meaningful distinction between cultivating loving awareness of the perfection of all that is and a wholehearted YES to alleviating suffering in the world, between art and activism, poetry and spiritual practice, between self as separate and Self as one with the One." -Mirabai Starr, author of Wild Mercy and Caravan of No Despair "Sitaram Dass is a writer in the tradition of the great mystic poets: Kabir, Rumi, Hafiz, and the original Mirabai, and his use of language is infused with that divine spark. His poems awaken joy, which often is in short supply. His essays explore how the teachings of Ram Dass and Neemkaroli Baba relate to materialism, gender and race, and the delicate balance required in holding suffering, compassion, karma and grace in one life. I loved reading this book: as he says Ram Dass taught him, Sitaram Dass shows us an example of what is possible when we fully honor our human hearts." -Mirabai Bush, founding director of Contemplative Mind in Society and author of Walking Each Other Home "There is sweet wisdom here and deep devotion, and Ram Dass's love perfume that infuses SitaRam's words and heart, offered here to you." -Jack Kornfield, founding teacher of Spirit Rock Meditation Center and bestselling author of A Path with Heart "In the many hours, days and weeks I shared with Sitaram Dass at Ram Dass's home on Maui, I was always deeply touched by his kindness, his sweetness, his intelligence, and his devotion. He is a relatively "young" man who embodies the wisdom, depth, and clear perception of a very old soul. His dedication to caring for Ram Dass was deeply touching. And it was abundantly clear how very much Ram Dass loved him . . . and enjoyed his Presence. This lovely collection of poems and writings emerged from Sitaram Dass's joyful, radiant Heart. They offer the reader a delicious taste of the unfolding of the Light on one Beautiful Soul's journey hOMe." -Ramananda John E. Welshons, author of One Soul, One Love, One Heart and When Prayers Aren't Answered "In this beautiful book, Sitaram Dass sings his boundless love of serving Ram Dass and his guru, Maharaji, in sacred poetry and consecrated prose. You'll fall in love along with Sitaram-and for those of us blessed to spend time in the divine household on Maui, it all rings true. I'm inspired and touched by Sitaram's generous, courageous revealing of his heart's journey to God. I can feel the love and joy that suffuses it all. May you bathe in Sitaram's wisdom and compassion as you savor the learning he offers to our world." -Trudy Goodman, founder of InsightLA
Download or read book 329 Haiku Poems For Your Spiritual Practice written by Adrian Tanase and published by BoD – Books on Demand. This book was released on 2019-01-11 with total page 70 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 329 Haiku Poems For Your Spiritual Practice is a collection of zen haikus that are created to inspire you more in your practice, on your spiritual path. Each haiku (short 3 lines japanese zen poem) is intended to be read slowly and meditated upon. It will bring mindfulness and improve meditation to the one who practices it. The book is organized in 29 categories, all related to virtues, human traits and spiritual terms. May these poems that I wrote with much love, help you with your spiritual practice and guide your heart on the path of beauty and exquisiteness. Namaste
Download or read book When Poets Pray written by Marilyn McEntyre and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 2019-05-28 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two dozen select prayer poems to learn from and live with Poetry and prayer are closely related. We often look to poets to give language to our deepest hopes, fears, losses—and prayers. Poets slow us down. They teach us to stop and go in before we go on. They play at the edges of mystery, holding a tension between line and sentence, between sense and reason, between the transcendent and the deeply, comfortingly familiar. When Poets Pray contains thoughtful meditations by Marilyn McEntyre on choice poems/prayers and poems about prayer. Her beautifully written reflections are contemplative exercises, not scholarly analyses, meant more as invitation than instruc¬tion. Here McEntyre shares gifts that she herself has received from poets who pray, or who reflect on prayer, believing that they have other gifts to offer readers seeking spiritual companionship along our pilgrim way. POETS DISCUSSED IN THIS BOOK Hildegard of Bingen Lucille Clifton Walter Chalmers Smith Robert Frost Wendell Berry Joy Harjo John Donne Gerard Manley Hopkins Said Marilyn McEntyre George Herbert Thomas Merton Denise Levertov Scott Cairns Mary Oliver Marin Sorescu T. S. Eliot Richard Wilbur Francisco X. Alarcon Anna Kamienska Michael Chitwood Psalm 139:1-12
Download or read book Dharma Talk written by John Brehm and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2023-09-26 with total page 101 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A new volume of original poetry from the bestselling creator of Poetry of Impermanence, Mindfulness, and Joy. In Dharma Talk, award-winning poet John Brehm explores the perennial themes of aging, compassion, emptiness, nonseparation, and more. At once poignant and humorous, Brehm’s gentle, wry poems remind us that the personal and the universal are not different—and point us to the Dharma of everyday life.
