The Breathings of My Heart through Poetry - by Gloria Guest

For me, writing the ‘breathings of my heart’ as encouraged by William Wordsworth has often been a tentative sharing around the edges of my life; sometimes in one of the life lesson columns I used to write for the newspapers or perhaps in one of my blogs. Or maybe at a writers workshop or two where I opened up a part of myself I never had before.
My writing journey has been a long process of learning to trust God, myself and others and many days I still feel as if I am only on the beginning steps. Although I can write vulnerably and have, I am still hesitant to share it in a published format.  I often wish to be further up the ‘published’ staircase than I am, but it can all seem so daunting.  And so, a vital part of my journey has been learning about the gift of hope. 
It was Alexander Pope who penned the words, “Hope springs eternal,” in his 1733 Epistle, An Essay on Man. His words still ring true today.
In fact, Pope’s words remind me of a day a number of years back, when it felt like hope literally did spring right out of the desolate prairie, just for me.
I can still see myself sitting on that solitary hill on a cold spring day, ruminating over too many hopeless situations that were going on in my life.
And then I saw it; one simple little sign of life.
The following is a poem I wrote that came from the ‘breathings of my heart,’ that day on the hillside. In fact William Wordsworth himself  shared his own heart with us through his incredible gift of romantic English poetry. I find poetry to be a genre that winds more gently around those vulnerable places in my heart, wooing me to write and even share the 'breathings of my heart'  with others.

Hope

Signs of Life

Purple stems protruding from prairie earth

With snow still visible on the ground

A day when my heart seeks shelter and solace

How brave and fierce the Crocus is!

Not grown in potting shed or tended in gardeners plot

It’s undaunted courage inspires me and woos me

I cup them to my face

And inhale their fragrance of hope

While Creators breath midst prairie breeze

Surrounds my searching soul

During trying circumstance

                                                        Gloria Lynn Guest