Admire from afar

I receive Brain Pickings in my email box every Sunday morning. Today's column highlighted wonderful line drawings of Every Person in New York: Illustrated. Then... another book of people in San Francisco... line drawings filled in with watercolors. I wish I could draw like that.

So many ways

To view the world;

So many ways

To describe the world.

I try to stand back

Admire from afar

Without being jealous

Of a turn of phrase,

A drawing which captures

That particular gesture.

Never mind.

So many ways

Admire from afar

Add my own sparkle

To the world

By writing every day

By paying attention

To the words

To the pictures others draw

Release what I have done

Into the world

Admire from afar

What others see

Add my words to the mix.

The crow

Admiring the crow through glass.

The crow has settled

Into the backyard ash.

With doors and windows closed

In winter cold,

We watch him open and close his beak.

From his posture

We know he pontificates

From his pulpit

In the tree.

We see his open beak.

We can almost hear him

Because we know and admire crows.

They are lovely birds,

Even if their tone

Is raucous,

Even if sometimes they speak

Out of turn.

In the silence

Of the breakfast table

The crow speaks

From the ash.

We imagine

What he is saying.

We smile.

Proud

The word proud is an odd one.  We take pride in things we have had a hand in, a project coming to fruition, accomplishments like graduating from school, landing the perfect job, oh yes... and children.  Still... as soon as children are born, we have a hand in teaching them how to grow up, and make decisions, and find the world around them.  Still, my children have taught me how to be a better human being from the moment they came into the world.  I am proud of them for that.  I am prouder and prouder every moment.  Of course I am proud.  But admiration seems the next step after pride.  Maybe I will write about admiration tomorrow or the next day.

You must be proud,

They say,

Of your children.

They seem to know

They are part

Of a wider fuller world.

I am

Proud.

I could not be

Prouder.

The more I say the word

Proud

However

It takes on that narcissistic glow

As if I or my beloved

Were chief agents

Of this event.

Maybe it*s the Minnesota

In me.

Still

I am proud

Of the human beings

They are,

Of the fascinating beings

I have been able to watch

Grow:

From that knowing look

In their eyes

At birth,

To now,

To Infinity

And Beyond.

Admiration

I met a woman last week who had no vested interest in admiring me.  She did anyway.  And for the things of which I am most proud:  Care and compassion and priorities.  For my focus on peoples* strengths.  There was not a drop of skepticism about her.  Not a drop I tell you.  Not a drop.  Today I am once more reminded of the power in admiration.

There was admiration

In her eyes,

In her words.

None of the same ole

Same ole

Of course you figured out

How it could work

Nothing special there,

None of the same ole

Same ole

Nothing special there

No

Admiration: pure and simple.

Today I walk

With the knowledge

I have been seen.

Spring is in my step.

I met Admiration last week.

She is a quality

God inhabits.