Divine Play

Delightful surprises await us when we surrender our own notions of creativity and allow our creative spirit to play with us and through us. This poem reflects one such spontaneous experiment …

Divine Play

This perfect place
This golden jungle
Of laughing waters
Of raucous parrots,
Of extravagant blooms
This place of perfect freedom
To be
To create.

I relax in Your laughing arms
Your tender love
Your giggling tummy
Releasing all fears of failure
All perfectionism
All need to capture thought perfectly.

Instead, I paint with words
And allow them to tell their own stories.
Each one holds a world
And beyond that more worlds.
Then, laughing, You blow them all away,
Like so much dandelion fluff,
My carefully constructed worlds.

“Live them!” You say,
“Sense them, taste them, smell them
And as you do that
New worlds will form to the dance of your pen.
Let your pen dance you instead of the other way round.
It really is quite easy,” You smile.

Captivated, I try again.
“No,” You say, “Don’t try.
Simply be it.
Allow it to form
And allow it to dissolve, too, when I blow on it.
For it is all just Divine play.
And the blowing of dandelion fluff is just as sacred
As the construction of the perfect dandelion globe.

“Remember, each piece of fluff carries a seed
Allow those seeds to take flight
And see where they land.”

© Copyright 2003 by Gail Christel Behrend — All Rights Reserved

Hummingbird

In preparation for a client session, I was setting up my healing room (a glassed-in porch with a glorious view over water and mountains), when suddenly I had an unexpected encounter with a tiny winged visitor. This poem evokes my experience…

Hummingbird

A hummingbird flutters into the open window
And enters my healing room
Buzzing and beating against the glass ceiling
Looking for a way out.

Who is this tiny messenger
Who dares to enter this sacred precinct?
Risking its life in the unknown
Eyed by three hungry cats.

It only seems to understand “up”
And beats uncomprehendingly upon the glass roof,
While inches below lies the open window and freedom,
Ignored in its instinctive flight.

I gently cup it in my hands.
It stops fluttering for a moment
And rests as I transport it
Down the short distance to its release.

Holding my hands outside
I barely open them and it is off,
Zooming southwards towards the trees.
And I am blessed by the memory of its lightness.

© Copyright 2002 by Gail Christel Behrend — All Rights Reserved

In Defense of Blondes

After hearing one too many blonde jokes, the urge rose up in me to speak out. This poem is the result…

In Defense of Blondes

My hair, it is fair
And I’m happy to share
That it comes from my Nordic parentage.
I’m a woman, it’s true,
My eyes, they are blue,
And my IQ within normal percentage.

I have a degree.
Four long years, it took me
Of study and research profound.
So it irks me when taught
All that was for naught
To the jokesters, I’m just a dumb blonde.

It seems nothing I do
Will loosen the glue
With which this label sticks to me.
But I refuse to despair
Or to dye dark my hair
Cause I like the attention it brings to me!

© Copyright 1998,2011 by Gail Christel Behrend — All Rights Reserved

Message from the Muse

This poem arose spontaneously in response to a creative writing class exercise — we were asked to imagine receiving a letter from our Creative Self…

Message from the Muse

Laughter is in the silence
Unheard, but felt inside
Like bubbles of champagne
Rising up through the sorrow,
The heaviness of rigid expectations,
And the broken promises to yourself.

Let go of it all!
Rise up and dance
To the moonlight orchestra
And the symphony of the stars.
Jig to the reel of Spirit,
Kicking and strutting in time
With the turmoil of Life,
Noisy and messy as it is.

Mind it not,
This noise and messiness,
For it is the rhythm
Of Life itself expressing
Through organisms
Made of blood and flesh.

Feel the laughter of your cells
As they dance the eternal dance,
The ebb and flow of the breath
Keeping time with their antics.
It is their breath, too.

Breath-less now,
In their swirling, ecstatic motion
Faster, and faster still,
Little whirling dervishes,
Forming the prayer of your Soul
To live fully, timelessly,
In the Now.

Relax and laugh, my dearest ones,
And let the music of that laughter
Carry you away
Until you, too, know who you really are
And what is really important.
Important enough
to laugh for,
to live for,
And to dream into existence.

For you are dreamers all
And this dream is your creation.
May your dream be worthy of you,
A true expression of your Being.

© Copyright 2002 by Gail Christel Behrend — All Rights Reserved

Poet’s Lament (Circle of Words)

In a creative mood, I felt the urge to write in circles whatever wanted to come through me. The following poem is the result…

Circle of Words


The Word is the beginning of all things
The Seed at the center of the Spiral.
I laugh at the playful absurdity
Of trying to write in circles,
Hoping to articulate the Truth
I feel at the centre of my Being.
Ah, words—so useless and fragmentary.
Ah, Word—so Powerful and yet
So distant from my mind,
As I fumble with the day to day
Vocabulary of my brain,
All meaning seeping out in the translation
Of what cannot be spoken
Only Known.

© Copyright 1998 by Gail Christel Behrend — All Rights Reserved

How Vision Influences Perception

A few years ago I played around with natural means of improving my vision, using eye exercises etc. One of the things I explored was the psychological impact of vision – I noticed that wearing glasses tended to make me more logical and analytical, whereas fuzzy (unassisted) vision tended to put me in a more relaxed contemplative state. Here is a poem that emerged during these investigations. Has anyone else noticed this phenomenon? Why not comment below.  I’d love to hear about your experience!

My Fuzzy Eyes

My fuzzy eyes see a world still new,
Free of defect and gently hued.
They do not see the cracks and stains,
The dirt, the scuff marks or hairy drains.

An impressionist world opens up instead,
A needlepoint tapestry of delicate thread,
With subtle textures that when softly viewed
Create in me a kindly mood.

The scattered litter in the grass
And the gleaming shards of broken glass
Become but flowers growing in the light
And sparkling dew, like diamonds bright.

Now, I do have the latest in optical gear,
One pair for far, and another for near.
They show me a world that’s crisp and true
Not one single detail do they misconstrue.

So I can read tiny print in a magazine
And when driving, road hazards are easily seen,
But when all’s said and done, I realize
I much prefer my fuzzy eyes.

© Copyright 2002 by Gail Christel Behrend — All Rights Reserved

Catching a Passing Poem

It’s funny how poems arrive when you least expect them – the wild ones, that is. The opening lines of this one came zinging through my head as I was standing on one leg in the middle of a  yoga posture…

My Pet Ego

I have a pet ego
I keep it on a string
It leaps and snaps at empty air
And snarls at most anything.

It chases after anyone who runs from it in fear
And gets downright annoying when a flea gets in its ear.
It digs away compulsively after every elusive bone
Then refuses to come quietly when I try to bring it home.

Now, you might ask
What is it then that makes me keep this pet?
A question that I ask myself
When things get all upset!

The answer is, if truth be told,
And if you really want to know,
I keep this strange annoying pet
‘Cause it entertains me so!

© Copyright 1998 by Gail Christel Behrend — All Rights Reserved