Category: Annie’s World

It is a slow art…
To walk through fire without getting burned…
Like Daniel, whole and unblemished…
Understanding yet another secret about ourselves.

It is like being pulled through a knothole…
Past so many sketches and blueprints…
Where nothing resembles the answer…
Emerging without even the faintest smell of smoke.

For each of us, the temperature of the furnace is different…
What is hot for me may be cool for you…
Some flames being pasty and pimply…
Others glinting like the sun.

I have not yet learned how to dance in the flames…
I see others, the child-like people…
But the sparks always lead to something new and exciting…
And somehow, I emerge as a better pup.

I love you,

Annie

I rise when my heart is open…
Like an eagle catching an updraft in the wind…
So full of trust, without fear…
With always changing glimpses…

I fall when my heart is closed…
For good reason or not…
Tossed about like a hat in the wind…
Overcome with worry.

Today, my heart is open…
A brand-new Annie has awoken from her sleep…
I’m young, I’m a puppy…
Skipping down the pebbled pathways.

Yesterday, my heart was closed…
There was no happiness at any level of my breakfast…
I was in that familiar place of feeling unfamiliar…
Surrounded by too many questions about right and wrong.

Which one do you think I like the most?
Opened and closed both stand on the edge of the dance floor…
The answer is obvious…
Because I love to dance.

Come dance with me!

I love you,

Annie

There is a songbird bird that lives inside me…
The bird sings for joy…
Her voice falls in a smooth and curving arc…
Only to ascend to heaven again.

She is a miracle of grace…
A free, wild, spirit given…
Full of autumn-like colors…
When everything explodes into color.

She reminds me of how blessed I am…
Helps me create thoughts that make me smile…
Like a sheet cake big enough for me to sleep on…
That somehow disappears by morning.

She makes me stretch even longer…
Brings new tides each day…
Some of the waters are compassion…
Some of the waters love.

Funny, how I just noticed her…
Has she been inside me all along?
Today, she tells me I only belong to the good things…
And that, is all I need to know.

I love you,

Annie

I read the letter twice…
What wonderful handwritten text…
My thoughts swirling and whirling…
Standing like a child beneath the open sky.

Drowned with emotion…
In numb disbelief…
Taking me within myself…
Like the first time I found summer.

It was if I was handed a flower…
It’s voice, in a nice, quiet way…
My paws shake, like trembling grass…
What a beautiful way to experience grace.

The letter leaves me with an open question…
Where else may this path lead?
It hints, like a slow, smooth dance…
I think I may know the answer…
To a place where beauty holds all the sway.

I read the letter twice…
Such a wild, incomprehensible gesture…
Thank you for thinking of me…
I’ll save it somewhere special where I can read it many times more.

Letters and notes are so important.

I love you,

Annie

I smile kindly at the river…
Kindly at the sea…
Kindly at all living things…
For kindness is me.

I smile kindly at the starlight…
Kindly at the moon…
Kindly at the sun…
For their light is in me.

I frown at this strange, foolish world…
Frown at its recipes for despair…
Frown at the gray and the darkness…
For darkness isn’t me.

I laugh loudly at the years…
Laugh at the wonderous path it has been…
Laugh at the angelic florescence in my rearview mirror…
For every step has been me.

So, smile kindly at your neighbor…
Laugh with your old friends…
Dance in the light…
Kick darkness in the ass…

For kindness, light and laughter are you!

I love you,

Annie

Things change quickly…
Like the invisible sweep and surge of the sea…
I know that none of my toys or blankets or beds are truly mine…
What I’ll have tomorrow, who knows?

Hang on, hang on (Grrrr!)
Like a tug-a-war I’m not letting go…
So, what if it has tears and bruises…
It is mine, and you can’t have it.

But what about those things that don’t change?
The feelings, the memories, the letters, the words…
The soft and joyful love of my butlers…
These all, like soft, powdered sand beneath my paws.

I need to figure out how to make these things my solid staff…
Instead of my favorite toy…
I think I could do it except for Bruiser, you know the real fuzzy one…
Or the warmth of my flannel blanket.

This is the great art I am trying to learn…
The secret to happiness…
Fixing my heart on the things in life that really matter…
The stuff that won’t go away.

I love you,

Annie

Guess what?

I know where the dew is made…
The place of the vibrating still waters…
Sprayed and poured out each day…
Season after season forever and always.

It is my special spot in life…
With the aroma of dew dripping blossoms…
And the sugary taste of striped candy…
All calling out my name.

How do I know this place?
Because I have the paws of a pilgrim…
I can understand life’s riddles…
And have figured out that all life’s riddles lead to the riddler.

From here, I see this world’s charms and faults…
Can separate experience from innocence…
And even though I wander far away…
The dew always follows me.

How can anything in this world be amiss…
With the morning dew, even the thorns have no sorrow…
Come, I will show you the place…
And together we can swim in the still, quiet waters.

I love you,

Annie

Everyday, I remember, the people have brought me here…
Into this timeless perfection…
I don’t need to be in a position of pondering…
Or thinking about verses or my favorite sayings or quotes.

When I think of you, I’m reminded, “Pay attention! Something wonderful is about to happen!”
Often, I’m too absorbed in myself to notice…
Other times, I feel your love hovering over me like a puff…
You are in the air I breathe, light and wild.

Our relationship is a place of inexhaustible riches…
It is here, not on the other side of some mountain…
Poof! There it is with merely the thought of you…
The place where I look forward to life in all its brilliance.

Oh, the joy, the curiosity our friendship brings…
Yielding so easily…
Everything flecked with blues and greens…
So many twinkling lights and shapes…

Your love is what has brought me here…
Friendship about the “old ways” and the “new…”
This is the eternal way and indestructible…
You know the words Faith, Hope and Love…

And our friendship is the greatest of all.

I love you,

Annie

I have power over the spirits of good or evil…
The alternating patterns of white and black…
Yes, indeed, sometimes it is a tricky situation…
But I know the trick.

I have a key to doors that are latched and thought can not be opened…
I have found a way through the un-passable paths…
Past the pillars of flames…
Around the arguments of “who has it worse.”

I live in a different world…
A light and living world…
Airy winged…
Springing up like yellow daffodils.

All I have to say to darkness, “Simon Says be gone!”
Spit out the stale wine…
Say no to what is evil…
And yes, to what is perfect.

Why is it that things that are free are not valued…
When they are the most valuable things of all…
Life and freedom come without a cost…
Yet, we would rather buy darkness.

I love you,

Annie

I know nothing of that one thing…
In spite of all the pain and loss…
I wonder, is it really necessary to know…
To me, I believe it is.

I don’t think Hollywood can tell me…
I’ve watched endless hours of television on my butler’s lap…
It’s the same thing over and over again…
About whom does what and to whom.

Maybe it’s hidden in the glittering treasures of this world…
Underneath the golden lace…
Or in the bottom of a bottle of old brandy…
Together with the headache and pain.

The answer always seems to lay ahead, somewhere in the distance…
In the cooling breath of the mist…
Yet, it disappears always into darkness…
My eyes always lose focus…
Even though I was born from the light.

It is the place where my loved ones have left for…
I pray they’re happy and safe…
I hope they are not forever gone…
Because I have more game I would like to play with them.

I love you,

Annie