Harrison Root

In the trials of life measured only by sweat and grit,
Do you have what it takes to greet challenge, not forfeit? 
And through the unstable, the changing unplanned;
Is the strength found within you, to intrepidly stand?

When the weight of the pressure all life's given freely;
And the awareness of trembling courage felt keenly;
On your shoulders the mass of all air, sea, and land;
With all this to trouble you, still will you stand?

Stand with the purpose of never never failing?
Stand with the promise of each problem assailing? 
Stand with resolve to be, in trouble, strong handed?
That when it's all over you can say, "I have standed!"

Something snapped inside me, I can't describe it, or put it into words.
You wouldn't realize unless you know me, and only then if you knew me well, and had heard,
The quiet questions rising slowly, asking to be voiced but only when its calm, at night,
If you were present in that stillness and had listened past the surface words, you might
Have felt the undercurrent surge, have caught a glimpse of that severed cord
Have seen a shadow of turmoil that now I feel I can't afford.
I smile, I laugh when I'm supposed to, most times it feels like its an act;
I pretend to be carefree, try to follow conversation, when, in fact
My mind is drifting, roaming places that feel a million miles away;
It feels as though I must say goodbye to a part of me that I deeply wish could stay.
I'm sure that this is necessary, I trust that good, at least, "can" follow,
But the broken thing is what was known, and that's a heavy pill to swallow.

Sunday morning
With adorning 
Clothes, the people come

Ironed dresses
Pants with creases
Early prep all done.

Singing starting
Hynm books parting
People slightly swaying

Preacher speaking
Hard pews creaking 
In the sunlight streaming 

People stare
Stagnate air
Try maintaining sleepless

Another song
Far too long
Children getting restless

End is near
Almost here
Yet one more rabbit trail

Eyebrows bunch
It's Time for lunch
Babies start to wail

Service ends
Meal begins
Another summer Sunday.

There's something about a morning, quickly come, and quickly gone,
But the freshness and the beauty makes it worth that morning yawn.
Watch the sun slow dry the dew
And light against the dark does move
Still and calm and fresh and clean is the invite from a dawn.

Looking through a doorway
 that seems so dark, 
I struggle to believe that You have any good in mind.

As I process the loss
 that I must choose,
I tell myself 
that through it I will find

That You are good.

That within the darkness I see now
 somewhere there is light;
And when You've brought me through
 this shadow, I just might
 smile; and know that 
You are good

For always, forever, my love never ending
My arms always open, my ear always bending
To hear you, Yes You, the words from your lips
To embrace you, surround you with warm love's eclipse. 
Perfection: too feeble a word to describe
The depths of the promise filled cup we enbibe.
I am the place you can share and confide
Your troubling feelings, your prayers thought denied.
I care for you, walk with you through calm and wild,
I am with you through thick and through thin, my child.
For you, and your best I'll be always defending,
For always, forever, my love never ending.

In the twenty-three years I have lived,
I have seen what pain can do to a man.
I have seen what jealousy can destroy,
what betrayal can steal,
and what silence can say
when words are no longer enough.
I have watched people promise forever
with the same mouths
they would later use to say goodbye.
I have seen hands that once held each other tenderly
become strangers,
and hearts that once beat in unison
learn to survive at different rhythms.
I have seen love.
Or perhaps, I have only seen
what people are willing to call love.
Because the older I grow,
the less certain I become
that I understand this thing at all.
And today,
I want to talk about it.

Not the love they put in songs,
nor the kind they sell in movies,
where two people find each other,
overcome a few obstacles,
and live happily ever after.
I want to talk about the love that stays
long after happiness has left.
The love that sits beside you in silence
while your mind begs you to walk away.
The love that knows every reason to leave
yet searches desperately for one reason to stay.
I want to talk about the love
that makes a fool of an intelligent man,
that turns certainty into questions,
strength into vulnerability,
and pride into a prayer whispered
to a God who may already know the answer.
Because somewhere along the way,
we have made love too beautiful to be understood.
We have dressed it in flowers,
perfumed it with promises,
and convinced ourselves
that if it hurts, it must be meaningful;
if it lasts, it must be true;
and if we cannot let go,
then perhaps we were never meant to.
But I have begun to wonder


whether our hearts are wiser than we think
or simply better at lying to us.
They say love is a feeling.
But feelings change.
The sun rises and sets.
Seasons abandon the trees they once adorned.
The same sky that welcomes the morning
eventually swallows the light.
And if love were merely a feeling,
what would remain when the feeling disappeared?
Perhaps love is a decision.
Perhaps it is sacrifice.
Perhaps it is the quiet determination
to choose another person
even on the days when choosing them
costs you something.
But even that explanation feels incomplete.
Because how do you explain the person
who has hurt you repeatedly,
yet whose happiness still matters to you?
How do you explain the anger
that rises in your chest
when you remember what they did,
followed by the unbearable tenderness

i know the girl i'm dreaming of is somewhere deep inside.
but i fear the pain of changing, and the parts i'll leave behind.
i see her in the miror, the girl i ment to be,
but every step towards her feels like i'm losing part of me
there's a future i keep dreaming of, but i'm scared i'll never see
if she knows how hard i'm trying, if she'd even be proud ,
or if she'd look into my eyes and ask why i keep backing down.
then one day i'll wake up, and the miror feels atrange,
same room, same face,but somehow everything has changed.

I am a writer, but I don’t make the words
I simply direct them like sheep in a herd
Sometimes an outpouring    
Sometimes they are mined
Sentences rough, needing cut
And like clay, needing molded
Lapidarist, a potter, a shepherd, a poet
Word are but a medium, a way to make art
And yet they’re the window to see straight to my heart

Bedsheet crumpled in soft swirls
Sunlight streams in through dusty glass
Books stacked high in bricks of color
It stays the same as the seasons pass

Movie nights and lazy mornings
Piles of blankets when snowflakes fall
The squeaking of a ceiling fan,
Laughter, and tears echo off the walls

A place of comfort, a place of rest
There I am like a bird in her nest

The path of life may not be straight
We may falter coming out of the gate
Questioning the path of  the twisted road
Left or right; up or down ; a precarious load
The ground can be   shaky, but you  are never alone
Guidance is there as you  step on each stone
Trust in its power and the love so profound  
As you softly tread on its  sacred ground

by Alison Johnstone

I stood there in a field 
hearing the sounds of the early birds and the wind hugging the trees
we like to call it silence, but I call It peace
there is not another soul in this wilderness but my own
and I'm free, lost in a place of forgiving water and soulful leafs,
that flow, and blow so gracefully, above my head and under my feet