Sandra Heska King

daring to open doors

  • Home
  • About
  • DISCLOSURES
    • Amazon Affiliate
    • Book Reviews
  • Published
  • Contact
  • Blog
    • Commit Poetry
    • Dared

Kissed (Making Manifest: Week Two)

May 15, 2014 By Sandra Heska King

pink petals

 

I glance out my window at the crabapple tree. I wait all winter for it to burst into bloom. I watch the bright pink buds pop and the blossoms unfurl. But it’s all lasted this spring for only a brief breath, and already in the rain and chill of this week, the blooms have faded, and petals litter the yard.

The Psalmist reminds us that our lives too, are but a breath, “for they quickly pass, and we fly away.” (Psalm 90:10, NIV)

Too often we rush time, waiting for and counting on the next thing instead of sinking into the present moment, paying attention to each breath. Instead of shushing ourselves to hear God, to sense creation’s kiss and the Spirit’s embrace.

I’ve been waking up earlier these days–another perk of spring when the light tiptoes onto my pillow. I love listening for the first bird’s cheep and seeing the sun blush in the east.

Morning is my best quiet time.

Dave Harrity agrees. ” . . . you miss a peace when you sleep through the morning.” he writes in Making Manifest: On Faith, Creativity, and the Kingdom at Hand. “Yes, sleeping is peaceful, but it’s a passive peace–you don’t chose it, you don’t experience it–you live through it, unable to acknowledge the moments it fills. But the quiet of the morning is peace that you live in. As Christ is in this world, he’s in this place. He’s in it everywhere–in the ever-expanding space above you, the tiniest ticking from the clock, the coughs and creaks of this space settling.”

I don’t want to sleep through any God-kissed, pink-petaled moments.

I want to cup each one with my words–with poetry.

One of our assignments this week was to write about our first kiss, and I remembered a fourth-grade peck on the cheek. But our day-14 assignment was to again go back through all our week’s notes,to cull some stand-out words and phrases, to look for “threads to pull.” Again, we were asked to create a ten-line poem, but this time it needed to include at least three similes–one of which had to be about kissing. And I remembered yet another kiss.

kissed

 

Kissed

Memories fade fast like the crabapple blossoms on my favorite tree.

But it’s raining pink petals that swirl and twirl like a lovers’ dance,

and the breeze carries me back to the Waterfall where I order a shrimp salad

because he wears a suit to work, and his parents drive a Mercedes,

and it seems extravagant. And when the music stops, after we dance,

he presses me to his chest for just the pinch of a moment.

A balloon inflates in the pit of my stomach.

I turn my face toward heaven, and a

a petal’s damp, velvet lip brushes my cheek

like that first shy kiss at my apartment door.

 

pink petals 2

 

Note: I married that “kisser” six months later, 42-1/2 years ago.

In the stillness,

Sandy

Now it’s your turn. If you’re journeying through Making Manifest this month, feel free to link up a post below. If not, maybe you’d like to share your day-14 poem in the comments.

And here are a couple questions for everyone:

Is it possible that the act of kissing might help us to understand God in a unique way? Why or why not? 

Describe a recent God-kissed moment.

An InLinkz Link-up


 

 

Share this:

  • Email
  • Print
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Pinterest

Filed Under: Blog, Making Manifest, poetry

Comments

  1. Dea says

    May 15, 2014 at 11:49 pm

    Memories do fade. Maybe the the memories on top go first before the deep memories of love inflating within like a ballon. I just couldn’t get my “kiss poem” to leave it’s lipstick print upon the page. Maybe another day.

    • Bonnie says

      May 17, 2014 at 4:43 am

      Do memories really ‘fade’? Or do they just get layered over and tucked away? For me, since his death, the memories return, in soft tender moments of joy forgotten. His first brush of a kiss on my cheek, then softly on my lips…..I think I now know where my ‘Kiss Poem’ is leading me. I too have put it off to wait until it jumped at me…..you ‘opened’ my door to the memory. But hank you!

      • Sandra Heska King says

        May 20, 2014 at 12:37 pm

        Perhaps we’ve lived with those earlier memories so long, we’ve tucked them away… layered them as Bonnie says. Maybe they’ll reappear as we grow older. When my father-in-law was evaluated in his later years, it seems the doctors explained he could remember things from way back better than yesterday because he had lived so long and had so many memories. (Maybe there wasn’t much room for more.) That there was probably an awful lot he’d forgotten, or layered away because he had so much to remember.

  2. Alyssa Santos says

    May 16, 2014 at 1:03 am

    Oh, I just love this.
    I was gardening this week and stood beneath the crabapple tree near our front door and the honeybees whizzed and sang and stilled me. I couldn’t see them darting as they were in the clouds of pink above my head but I sank in the moment of the sunshine and pinkly dropping petals and the song of bees. I’m happy you wrote it into a kiss story – the perfect thing to do.

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:39 pm

      That’s beautiful, Alyssa. I don’t remember the orioles in the tree at all last year. But there were lots of bees. This year, I don’t remember seeing bees… but there were lots of orioles dancing and singing in that tree.

  3. Bruce Barone says

    May 16, 2014 at 11:27 am

    I love this post.

    And believe it or not I was reading about kissing in today’s Wall Street Journal!

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:40 pm

      😀

  4. Lorretta says

    May 16, 2014 at 11:28 am

    Another moment to breathe deep the gathering blooms…

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:40 pm

      Just keep breathing. Just keep breathing…

  5. Diana Trautwein says

    May 16, 2014 at 3:23 pm

    Lovely, Sandy. Maybe I’ll blog about this journey this week . . .

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:41 pm

      I hope so. I guess I better get over to your place and see if you have yet. 🙂

  6. Dolly@Soulstops says

    May 16, 2014 at 3:27 pm

    Sandra,
    Just gorgeous…I’m swooning over your photos and poem 🙂

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:42 pm

      Thank you, Dolly.

  7. Tarissa says

    May 16, 2014 at 3:56 pm

    I loved this, Sandy! I’ve never enjoyed getting up in the morning as much as I have the past 15 days. No more snooze button. As soon as my eyes open, I know I’m off to meet with God – to make manifest! I don’t want to sleep through any God-kissed, pink-petaled moments either. Thank you for sharing your beautiful photographs and the story of that first sweet kiss with your husband! An all-together lovely post. 🙂

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:43 pm

      Love this, Tarissa. Since I worked my way through L.L. Barkat’s book, God in the Yard, I feel like I’m missing something if I sleep in.

  8. Martha Orlando says

    May 16, 2014 at 7:08 pm

    “I don’t want to sleep through any God-kissed, pink-petaled moments . . .”
    Just after I read this post, my daughter arrived and began showing me photos of our granddaughter, Savannah, who is still in the hospital with some complications; no worries, she will be fine! But, oh, what a pink-petaled moment it was to see this child’s perfect little face!
    Yes, we need to rise and shine, ready to greet the moments God has in store for us, with open eyes, ears, and hearts.
    Blessings, Sandy!

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:44 pm

      I’m so glad she’s doing better, Martha. And now I’m thinking of rosy pink baby lips. 🙂

  9. Megan Willome says

    May 17, 2014 at 9:47 am

    This is so good, Sandy! I’ve never written about a kiss. And kissing is such an odd business, don’t you think? I’m thinking of the way it grosses out younger kids. But at some point, you grow up a little and embrace the grossness and it’s no longer gross–it’s wonderful.

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:45 pm

      It is odd. We should study its history sometime. And do Eskimos really kiss with their noses? What if they’re dripping from the cold?

  10. Lynn D. Morrissey says

    May 19, 2014 at 6:27 pm

    So sweet, lovely, a beautiful remembrance.
    Just the idea of “kiss” made me also think of these quotations about the Kiss of God, and I thought I woudl share:

    “Let us not suppose ecstasy is ruled out for ordinary people like ourselves. It is not as though we had invented it, or as though we had written the rules. The Lord seizes us suddenly with a quick burst of affection. His power flows to us. He sweeps us up. Everything else stands still for a kiss that is passionate, tender, demanding. In anticipation of this kiss, whole lives are altered and overturned. In the aftermath of this kiss, destinies and ambitions and careers are discarded like old pairs of gloves. This is a sign of love in which there is no disenchantment, no chance of boredom, no ultimate letdown. All is climax. This kiss is the pledge of a union that feeds and heals us, clothes and shelters us, that makes us Christ.=” —Emily Griffin

    “God created people very good. God not only needed to speak, but to bring His image alive in humanity, He needed to breathe His life directly into our lungs. The description could not be more intimate or personal: “The Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being” (Gen. 2:7). Our story begins with a kiss, mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, God pressing against us. We begin when God exhales and we inhale. This is the level of intimacy and synchroneity for which we were always intended.” —Erwin McManus

    • Diana Trautwein says

      May 19, 2014 at 6:31 pm

      Lynn – these are both fabulous quotes!! I’m copying them into my way-too-long ‘quotes worth saving’ document. Thanks so much.

      • Lynn D. Morrissey says

        May 19, 2014 at 7:27 pm

        Aren’t they great, Diana? I h ad to smile about your file. I have one of those too! Happy quoting.
        Fondly,
        Lynn

    • Sandra Heska King says

      May 20, 2014 at 12:52 pm

      “Our story begins with a kiss, mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, God pressing against us. We begin when God exhales and we inhale.” Swoon.

Trackbacks

  1. A Tale of Two Bicycles: What God is Teaching Me About Freedom | Introverted Mama says:
    May 16, 2014 at 4:14 pm

    […] joyfully linking up this week with Sandra Heska King as we continue to make manifest and with Jennifer Dukes Lee to #TellHisStory […]

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Flickr
  • Google+
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Meet Sandra

I’m Sandra, a camera-toting, recovering doer who’s learning to be. still. Read more…

Get updates from the stillness by email

Your personal information is safe and will never be shared.

Archives

Categories

Instagram Inspiration

sandraheskaking

“Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous to “Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous to be understood. . . Let me keep company always with those who say “Look!” and laugh in astonishment and bow their heads.” ~ Mary Oliver in “Mysteries, Yes”
🌱
No way could anyone ever convince me that this world in all its beauty and creativity and mysteries is here by accident.
Food truck night with a newcomer—@crepstick. So Food truck night with a newcomer—@crepstick. So yummy! I hope they come back.  But maybe not too often or I’ll have to do double time on the exercise.
“Embrace this day knowing and showing the world “Embrace this day knowing and showing the world that your God is more than enough for you.”
🌿
@tamiheim @tonibirdsong 
In @stickyJesus: How to Live Out Your Faith Online
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the str My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion.” Psalm 73:26 (ESV)
🌿
I’d almost forgotten what quiet mornings on the patio were like. (Quiet except for the birds and the sound of the neighbor’s AC.)
So yesterday I saw my cardiologist. It was the fir So yesterday I saw my cardiologist. It was the first time he wanted to see me in 6 months instead of a year. He said my aortic stenosis had gotten worse. Like on the cusp of moderate to severe. 😬

So the first thing he asks me is, "How's you daughter?" Wait. Isn't this supposed to be about ME?

Then he asks if I've had any symptoms. "Well, I don't know. Maybe. I felt a little dizzy out of the blue a couple times. And felt like I couldn't catch my breath. I wouldn't have paid any attention if I didn't know I was supposed to be watching for symptoms. I DID walk all over Israel and up a bunch of steep hills, even all the way up to the Golan Heights--against the wind--without anything but normal fatigue.

He laughs. "I created a monster." Ummm, yeah.

"Have you been exercising?" 

"Well, yeah. We walk a couple miles a day. I'm back on my Nordictrack Strider." I didn't tell him I'd been lifting some light weights and some very heavy boxes and other items during this renovation, though I was told in December not to.

So he listens to the beating of my heart. Then he says, "Well, I don't think the valve is ripe yet. I don't expect you to have symptoms for three or four years. You don't need to come back for a year."

Wait! So you ask if I have symptoms. But you don't expect symptoms--yet. And when I do have symptoms, someone is gonna do something. And then I'll be older and maybe weaker. Or what if I have some sudden and silent symptom and boom! And now I have to worry about that. 

(In other news, my oldest grand texts me the other day, and our conversation runs like this...
Last weekend we were in northern Michigan. And the Last weekend we were in northern Michigan. And there were lilacs. They even shook their heads over tornado-induced devastation. Look for the beauty and sweet scents in the midst of the mess. I miss the lilacs.
Yesterday’s morning view. We haven’t seen the Yesterday’s morning view. We haven’t seen the sun all day today.
When the folks in my hometown of Gaylord, Michigan When the folks in my hometown of Gaylord, Michigan ate their breakfast Friday morning, they had no idea what terror and devastation they'd face before dinner. Everyone has a story. You've probably seen pictures.

If not, take a peek at @mlivenews .

My great-nephew, not quite 12, had just gotten home from school when the EF-3 came down the street and left its mark on every home. My niece frantically tried to find her way from work through debris and blocked roads. My sister was 30 miles away visiting my dad in rehab. I don't want to know how fast my brother-in-law drove. 

The house and yard took a hit, worse than some, not as bad as others. A mobile home park was demolished--two deaths there. I heard one person is still missing. So many injured. So much awful. But the town is coming together for each other. Pray for them.

We plan to fly up Thursday--already planned to celebrate my dad's 95th birthday. 

Also, if anyone feels led to help, the Otsego Community Foundation and Otsego County United Way are accepting donations. Note “Tornado Relief.” Beware of any other fundraising requests.
Cutting tonight’s walk short. Stupid blue jay. N Cutting tonight’s walk short. Stupid blue jay. Not this one. A different one. But still. (My niece believes blue jays are a visitation from Grandma—my mom.) 
My shirt says “Walk in love. But I’m not feeling very loving. And if it WAS my Mom AKA Mother Mary Esther of the Order of Perpetual Birdwatchers, I’ll bet she’s having a good laugh. A passerby said she heard it was good luck and I should buy a lottery ticket tonight. In other news, I also banged my hip bone against our bed’s footboard and gave myself a mighty bruise. Then I burned my arm on the top of the grill. I did manage to wash all the knives without cutting myself and didn’t start any fires. So how was your day?
And now… “From the rising of the sun to the pl And now… “From the rising of the sun to the place where it sets, the name of the Lord is to be praised.”
The world’s a mess, but His mercies are new. The world’s a mess, but His mercies are new.
When we were in Israel last month, we visited @yad When we were in Israel last month, we visited @yadvashem - the World Holocaust Center in Jerusalem. There wasn't enough time to spend nearly enough time. 

The Valley of the Communities was very moving. It's a labyrinth of stone from which there seems no way out. Our guide said It gives an idea of the endlessness of the horror. His parents emigrated from Vilna (the Jerusalem of Lithuania), before the Holocaust. In 1935, thirteen of his family members still remained there. By 1945 only one--an uncle--had survived. He wrote a book about them from a bundle of old letters. "One story out of millions."

"This memorial commemorates the Jewish communities destroyed by Nazi Germany and its collaborators, and the few which suffered but survived in the shadow of the Holocaust."
#Israel2022 #HolocaustRemembranceDay
“From my favorite spot on the floor, I look up a “From my favorite spot on the floor, I look up at the blue sky and the bare chestnut tree on whose branches little raindrops shine, appearing like silver, ” Anne Frank wrote in the Diary of a Young Girl. Watching the tree change through the seasons her family spent in hiding in an attic gave her hope. The Holocaust Memorial Center is one of only eleven sites in the United States to receive a sapling from that tree. I stand at “her” window and imagine hanging hope on a tree.

"It happened, therefore it can happen again: this is the core of what we have to say. It can happen, and it can happen everywhere.” ~ Primo Levi

From a post I wrote for @tspoetry after a visit to the @holocaustcenter.

https://www.tweetspeakpoetry.com/2016/07/27/regional-tour-holocaust-memorial-center-farmington-hills-michigan/
Stunning tree I parked near at Bible study yesterd Stunning tree I parked near at Bible study yesterday. I was in a rush and failed to snap the whole tree. I need to run back before the flowers fall. I think it’s a jacaranda? I want one.
Speaking of birds... bluejay in my backyard this a Speaking of birds... bluejay in my backyard this afternoon. I thought he was hurt, but I think he was just trying to cool off. (Maybe it's a young one.... unless it's the light?)
Someone should do something about that dog. She’ Someone should do something about that dog. She’s yelping and carrying on like she’s in some awful pain.
“Now in the place where he was crucified there w “Now in the place where he was crucified there was a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid.” ~ John 19:41

“But the angel said to the women, ‘Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay…’”~ Matthew 28:5-6

Many wonder if this tomb, which lies just a few yards west of Golgotha could be the place where Jesus lay and rose. I wish we could have lingered longer here in this garden and in the tomb itself. It was easier for me to imagine the events of that weekend happening here than in the heavily incensed, decorated, dark and crowded Church of the Holy Sepulchre… though my hairdresser said her old boyfriend “got chills”’when he entered that tomb. We did not go inside that one because the line was way too long. 

At any rate, the most important thing is that he tomb is EMPTY and HE IS RISEN!

HAPPY EASTER!
#Israel2022 #GardenTomb #Easter
 “Peter said to him, ‘Lord, I am ready to g 
“Peter said to him, ‘Lord, I am ready to go with you both to prison and to death’ Jesus said, ‘I tell you, Peter, the rooster will not crow this day until you deny three times that you know me.’” ~ Luke 22:33-34

The Church of St. Peter in Gallicantu (rooster crowing) built over what tradition says was the house of Caiaphas where Jesus was brought after he was arrested. Perhaps he was imprisoned in one of the underground crypts while awaiting trial. 

“On top of the church, higher than the cross—I loved this—stands a golden rooster! I’ll never look at a weathervane the same again. How would you like to have a church commemorate your weakest moment?” ~ Wayne Stiles in Walking in the Footsteps of Jesus

#Israel2022 #GoodFriday
The olive trees here are ancient… some carbon da The olive trees here are ancient… some carbon dates to the 12th century, according to my Eyewitness book on Jerusalem. “DNA tests have shown that eight of the trees grew from cuttings from the same mother tree—perhaps taken by Christians who believed the tree to have witnessed Jesus’s agony.” 

Gethsemane means “olive press.” Jesus was pressed to his very depths that night.  He knew what was ahead. He could have run far away. But he went where he knew Judas would look for him. 

“And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed, ‘Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.’ And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground.” ~ Luke 22:41-44

Garden of Gethsemane and Church of the Nations

#Israel2022
A "blue preacher" right outside my door, nearly as A "blue preacher" right outside my door, nearly as tall as I am. I wonder what he's wondering. Is he finding the answer blowing in the wind?

"Watch, now, how I start the day
in happiness, in kindness." ~ Mary Oliver in "Why I Wake Early"
Load More... Follow on Instagram

Get the Mug

Embrace the life you have t s poetry mug

Privacy Policy

Full privacy policy is available HERE.

I Read Light

TSP-Red button

bibledude-net



Sponsor a Child

Join the Compassion Blogger Network

[footer_backtotop]

Copyright © 2022 Sandra Heska King · Site by The Willingham Enterprise, LLC on the Genesis Framework by StudioPress · Log in