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To love Jesus is to long with Him
But that longing is not enough
There is a need
To structure our lives
Around spending time with Him.

To desire also means to be disciplined
And then, we found ourselves
Delighting in the Lord.
It captures the essence
Of what it takes
To develop a consistent devotional life.

You can be motivated with great desire,
But without discipline
You will never get there
Discipline positions us
To receive grace;
Discipline is not grace
It is the *submission of our heart

To encounter the grace of God.

It is not about whether God loves us —
His love is sure
Whether we are disciplined or not —
But it is our wholehearted response
To Him that allows us to find Him.

One must delight in the Lord
And shear every misfitting
And *earthly delights.
“It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be lifted up above the hills; and all the nations shall flow to it, and many people shall come and say: “Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths,” For out of Zion shall go the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” – Isaiah 2:2-3 (ESV)
phil roberts May 2017
Sometimes in life
I've taken all I that could get
And at other times
I've given all that I am
And then ultimately
I was empty of everything
And full of nothing
But at least I've lived
And lived hard at that

                                By Phil Roberts
Kuzhur Wilson Dec 2015
Yesterday
Was in the ecstasy
Of realizing that
We were
Those two
On earth
Who liked bitter gourd curry
Cooked with coconut milk ….

Remember?
Think it was
In the sixth life.
We were
Two nascent bitter guards
On the pandal
Spread in the northern corner
Of the farmland
Belonging to a grandmother
In a village in Mississippi
Who used to attend to the orchards
Sitting in a wheelchair.

We had
Watched earth
And peeked
At the sky
Hanging from the same stalk
The scar left
From your tight clasp on my thigh
Scared
After spotting a double tailed pest
Is still there.

The pleasure of that pain
Makes me tearful now.

I am like the faces
In the house of deceased
Sobbing
At times  
Bursting into tears
The next moment
Holding back
After a while.

Sometimes
I am all the faces
In the house of the dead
Tears have
Nothing to do with them.

Sometimes
The wedding house
Will laugh and laugh
Till its cheeks hurt.

Just like you.

My dear bitter guard,
When will we
Go back to that
Pandal in Mississippi
Where we had pulsated
From a single stalk?

Aren’t we the ones
To offer obsequies
To that grandmother
Who looked after us
With pots
Of wholehearted love?



Translator - Shyma P


Shyma P : Works in Payyanur College, Payyanur. Translator and film critic. Has translated poems and articles in Malayalam Literary Survey, The Oxford India Anthology of Malayalam Dalit Literature, online magazines like Gulmohar, Readleaf Poetry as well as scripts and subtitles for short films.
Pandal - natural roof made by plants
Rose Alley  Apr 2012
Wholehearted
Rose Alley Apr 2012
You've seen everything through my pulse, and
Yet I've lost sight in this empty cavity
A hole, hollow and holistic
Wholehearted and devoid of warmth
As if to thaw on a bed of roses
It feels graceful, tragic,

Reflective of Being
The bane of empathy
The sting of truth and honesty
Respective of living, living;

Eventually You will be replaced
In this heart shaped hole in my chest
Wholeheartedly
Marcella Barnes Feb 2012
Black is the color of my “true” love’s hair.
His nose a beak,
His chin, and aspects of his character, weak.
Why then, do I bother?
Well, I read once, that, “there are places in the heart that do not exist;
Suffering has to enter for them to come to be.”
And I’ve always been told to be wholehearted.

My blue eyed-devil suffered
From different variations of the same flaw
Or did I suffer him?
Or did I suffer, and in suffering, bring new flawed places to life?
If that is the case, then I should be called creator
God. Almighty in my abilities to generate where nothing was before.
And if I am so bold, so audacious, then wholehearted isn’t he?

I read again once, once again
That each time a heart breaks
There is more pain than the time before.
Medically this doesn’t make sense—
Shouldn’t the fractures be slightly more vulnerable, easier
To crack? Or is it that new compounds emerge—fresh and sharp
while ghost aches, echoes, and wind still haunt their ancestry?

Perhaps it is neither.
Perhaps, instead, it is not even a matter of the living and the dead,
But of the young and the elder,
And these wounded heart bones
Are simultaneously living new aches and old pains.
After all, I’ve also heard, that, “time is a white
man’s construct,” only serving as the bleached skeletal frame for our selves.

Picture that then,
The hollow-eyed skull of the universe
Watching as we give bits of ourselves away to time
So that we may under and stand existence—
Create those “new” places with the patches and sewing
Of our old hurts, and the stretching and tearing of new.
We become wholehearted.
Luna Lynn  Sep 2015
Standing Tall
Luna Lynn Sep 2015
in a world where we pray to be united
within the grasp of wholehearted humanity
standing tall
we sink in the dirt beneath our feet
and holding our heads up high we sing with the utmost pride
a song of which becomes a chanting notion
setting the tone for revenging entities
growing weary of the unwanted waste we toss our visions in the sea
without daring to take the promising chance

how are we to stand together
in a castle built to crumble in its past?

and yet we become the fools
lost in the fight and lost in our grieving
we walk the streets with our banners and our anger
without understanding what we are feeling

let me take you back to nineteen sixty three
when we marched on Washington
and we were lead by a King
what merely started as the seed of a dream
became the prelude to never ending history
yet with each milestone comes adversaries
and we still cry the tears of our fallen fathers
we still cry to be free

but remember my brothers and sisters
to be mindful in your actions
for blood does not wash blood away
and because the tongue can be a sword
be mindful of every single word you say
the whole world is unjust
be emotional if you must
but the time is now to be reflective
to be knowledgeable
to be respected
because the hearts of our sons and daughters
still need to be protected

the sun my still set orange
and they moon may still shine white
the day may still end at quarter to
the moment everything is night
and in each passing day are you going to become the change that is needed to win the fight?

are you going to do what's right?
(C) Maxwell 2015
Niko Walsh  Apr 2013
Literacy
Niko Walsh Apr 2013
I am literate in daydreams
and letting my imagination rule my head

I am literate in music
where rationale can be abandoned.

I am literate in procrastination,
pushing away my mind-defying.

I am literate in heartbreak
which has been already over-endured.

I am literate in lazy weekends
spent with my sister and a remote.

I am literate in creating;
not masterpieces, but heart and soul pieces.

I am literate in ramen noodle and green tea afternoons
in sweatpants and sneakers with no makeup on.

I am literate in moment-capturing
and finding the right words to explain.

I am literate in thunderstorms
and dancing in between water droplets.

I am literate in heart confessions
over acoustic guitars and games of solitaire.

I am literate in wanting
and taking away from what I already have.

I am literate in wanderlust
and a wholehearted need to escape.

I am literate in color-coordination and clothing arranging
and bringing out all my best.

I am literate in kissing with desperation
and wanting to have it be effortless.

I am literate in wasting my time
in my head, in my heart, and in the clouds.

I am literate in everything mentioned
and so much that I can’t even say.
Brent Kincaid Jul 2015
The old saying talks about
Being snug as a bug in a rug
But how can you feel that way
If you never ever get hugged.
If you hug your loved ones
They may not need drugs.
It’s an inexpensive medicine;
The basic household hug.

Worse things could happen
Than to catch the hugging bug.
It’s a better remedy than you
Can find in an apothecary jug.
It doesn’t require prescription
And is no big weight to lug.
You always have one handy,
The standard loving hug.

A hug can be the cure for you
When you are in a purple fug
And your face begins to look
Like a rather dyspeptic pug.
Somebody wonderful arrives
And gives your heart a tug
By giving you the all-time best
Wholehearted, loving hug.
Diana Mar 2014
I don't really know you
But I know that smile
I know it's not wholehearted
And I know that you're faking it
I know you're struggling
I know life is hard right now
I know you feel like nothing will get better
And I know you feel hopeless, lost
But I know other stuff, too
I know how happy you make people
I know how amazing you are
I know that your life is just at the start
And I know how great it will be
I don't know a lot of things
But I know that you can't give up
So please
Please don't give up
EC Pollick  Nov 2012
ass-shaking.
EC Pollick Nov 2012
When I walk down Shop Street
I shake my ***.
(Yeah, I do.)

I swagger
With the confidence
That yes
I am a foreigner
In your country
And yeah I say,
You’re alright.
But I
Am a newly awakened goddess.

And it took being heartbroken
And being drunk five nights  out of seven
And feeling like the water is going over my head
To say WAIT.
I am more than this.

And when you look at me
It won’t be because my *** is shaking
(although, that certainly helps)
It will be because
I EXUDE GREATNESS.
And you will want to know me.

I’ll be nodding my head from side to side
And shaking my hips like it is my God-given right
(it is)
And Instead of telling you how awesome you are
I’ll be telling myself.
Because that is the one person
whose been neglected from this equation
from the start.

When I ask
DO YOU THINK OF ME?
I’ll be asking myself.

And I’ll be replying  a wholehearted “YES”
As I shake my ***
Walking down Shop Street.
Elle Dhani  Aug 2022
Wholehearted
Elle Dhani Aug 2022
Love, he gave,
reciprocated not behave

His goals were colossal,
not as high as mine's mime

He made flowers coated in wine,
with fine strokes and time,
but,
he'd never felt I was lost,
bleary and unkind

in storms,
he ceaselessly heads to mold,
healthy vines...

— The End —