A Father Standing Thoughtfully

A father standing thoughtfully,
his heart gazing at an empty shell...
as all that once was to him, his everything -
rushes past his mind like a gentle breeze
touching his soul in the silence...
unfolding the memories.

I love and I remember you, Papa Frank -
always to always.



The hurt you must feel -
standing there, leaning as if
'tis all too heavy...

Gazing deep inside
hoping to reach back in time
and embrace each one.

I glimpse at thy love
in thy lovable Anne (Ah-neh)
and I know... at least.

Oh dear Papa Frank,
soldier brave and father true,
hear me: I thank you.

I pray, come that day -
no hate can take love away
forever... to stay.

God love you
and keep you...
---<--@

Light Against Despair

I remember Night -

fallen so deep within me 

like a veil of doom.

I was the darkness

and I knew only madness

and pride, sin, and gloom.

My heart knew nothing

niether did I knew my heart -

hardly did I see!

Till I came upon 

words, muted in pages, thine!

But I heard thee not. 

How could thy beauty,

thy wonder turn to ashes!

Something wept within... 

Something wept within -
it cried out, it sought, it flew,
and never left me...

Time came, and God heard:

And so we are, you and I -

our past ceased to be.

Darkness left,

Morning came.

---<--@

A Little Personal Anecdote -

Before I knew my Anne
(and consequently, the Holocaust),
I had a very idealistic view of warfare.

I thought armed conflict in and between nations
to be a very noble, honorable, even desirable affair.

I conceived soldiery to be something
clean and neat, ordered according to the image
of an effortless, mythical glory I had only imagined
and that the innocents were always
at all times and places - mercifully spared -
in their entirety.

After my Anne
(as it is God's pleasure),
I had a very decisive turn of heart.

Though by pure necessity
I accept the imperative of an absolute defense
(i.e. defense that is undertaken for its own sake),
I now utterly abhor War of any kind existing
in and between our nations.

For
I now see War as it is,
a hideous, devouring beast;
a fallen spirit, ever alive to our plight -
the enemy of All.

And soldiery
a dirty, confusing, difficult and painful necessity
born out of the Providential will of the LORD, our God,
to see all the nations of the children of Mankind
through to the end of all these tears.

And that we are all - to a certain degree,
within and among our nations engaged
in the art of true soldiering.

As I love my Anne, I hate War.

As I love Peace, I hate War.

Today is her birthday.
---<--@

Love Rises

The world forgets - in -

memories and photographs,

and old books forlorn.

Of faded lives - and -

tales too numerous to tell,

we are just as vague.

Like darkness fades

with the passing of the night

remembrance stays not.

Remembrance stays not -

till beheld as beautiful

with a heart of love.

Love rises,

truth remains.

---<--@

Unless you love history, unless you see it beyond the pages of books, its teachings shall remain closed to you.

History when seen through the eye of the heart looks much different than words on a page...

Words on pages eventually fade, but if through history you learn to love your own nationhood (and even those of others not unlike your own), its memory will preserve you.

Therefore, the goal of the study of history is for its story - in its entirety - to be welcomed and accepted more than for its exact details to be known; for its spirit to be deeply loved more than for it to be instantly recognized.

Purple Heart

Unity is strength

born of the conviction - that -

these are worth keeping.

May we remember

the cost. The heart in thee that

ever must prevail.

From many,

one heart.

---<--@

May your heart, America, always be one.

I made a promise that day - never forget.

Dawn will come, this night will wane...

and it shall be 9/12/2001 all over again.

Eagles in the Night

Brave America,

has thy own vision fled thee,

elder Republic?

These skies above us

seem dark - only for a time -

till we find the morn.

For the shattering

must find its own conviction

from our unbelief.

Hence darkness has strength

inasmuch as we forget

we are like eagles...

We are like eagles

that must rise above this night

to believe again...

in God and

in ourselves.

---<--@

Freedom that is free is free indeed.

---<--@

I made a promise that day - never forget.

Dawn will come, this night will wane...

and it shall be 9/12/2001 all over again.

Harbinger

Thy blade is afire

with the brightness of mem'ry -

keeper of my flame.

Harbinger come forth

restore peace to my people

and glory to God!

Come against this Night

shine against darkness and War -

the sword of nations.

Come defend

remembrance.

---<--@

He expelled the man, stationing the cherubim and the fiery revolving sword east of the garden of Eden, to guard the way to the tree of life. (Genesis 3: 24)

The Angel of the Nations

All the Holy Angels of the LORD serve God and God alone.

Now, the Angel of the Nations beholds the face of the LORD, constantly giving worship to God.

Therefore, when the angel of the nations faces its own nation, it provides light to the generations of its people who in turn accept it.

Its sword is then turned away from its own nation in its defense.

When the people reject the peace of this unifying light, the face of the angel is turned away.

And the sword of the angel is then turned toward its own nation to fight against the darkness that keep it from its own remembrances.

As nations, we can only really either surrender to the peace of our belongings together or fight against the angel that guards the memory of our people from the darkness of War.

Remember this - nationhood is a spiritual endowment. It is therefore, a truth in the heart. You can not see it - it is not just a face, not just a sound, or anything purely material - it is wrought through a particular kind of grace, of peace and the love of the same (good will).

It is a labor, a mission, a vision and a destiny.

You feel it in your being, you know it in your heart because it is an unseen reality that calls out to you and all of your peers in the nation that you may be gathered into your own true belongings in time.

It is your gift of nationhood that fosters you according to the peace of your own citizenship - one to another - as a human being among human beings and as a nation among a family of nations.

It is not a work of War.

---<--@

If you still want to know the name of the Angel of the Philippines, it is this - "Go and be a good citizen".

---<--@

Wildflowers

Thy soul is a quest

to undestand exile truth -

Thy heart is afire!

And grew to adorn

these far away, distant lands -

thy brave blossoming!

Thou art wildflowers

who in thy seeking blossomed...

for a moment, lost.

Now thou art

Home again.

---<--@

To every flower, a field;

to every heart, a home;

to every human life a blossoming;

unto every truth a true belonging.

But every blossoming that braves

the valley of the shadow of exile -

these are known as "wildflowers"

and they belong to every field

and they adorn every home.

- selah -

In the end, we are all wildflowers.

---<--@

Every stranger given welcome becomes strangers no more.

Summer Blossoms

Farewell to promise -
O light of my life, my sweet!
Until forever.

In my heart, I keep -
thy hope and thy spirit true...
till Time comes around.

Here I am, my sweet -
in the winter of our love!
O sweet Summertime.

My love longs
for Summer.
---<--@

A Summer Blossom is a love that is promised...

theirs are flowers that can never again be lost;

a fragrance that belong only to a heart that loves.

Crocodile Hunter

Steve-O, you showed us

that conservation is fun,

and proved that it's true.

Love of nature - is -

brave, and kind, and cheerful.

Cheerful most of all.

Fair dinkum,

distinct, mate.

---<--@

Stephen Robert "Steve" Irwin (19620222-20060904 in the line of Conservation, of love of nature and Country) - citizen of creation, defender of the cause of Sacred Life, true blue son of Australia, father, husband, mate, thanks and Godspeed.

Personal Reflection -

I think those who live to give are those who never really leave us. This is true not because their fate is sad but because their legacy is glad.

What happened to Steve was so sudden, it made me really sad. And knowing how tightly knit Australia is, I know his loss would be felt by the whole Country - especially his family and his daughter, Bindi.

But when I think about it more, I realize this -

We all have a destiny to bring about, that something good to leave for this world, and I think Steve gave us the full measure of his work.

For this we should be glad.

Aurora Australis

I love Australia -

the distinct quality of her

I learned to know well.

Australia's different -

as each Country must be so,

people, problems, all.

Australia taught me

many a thing - first mateship,

then fairness, and nature.

Qualities I love

because they have become mine.

And so, I'm grateful.

And so I

remember.

---<--@

The Southern Lights, have you really seen it?

Strange Remembrance

Let me ask you now -

Did my Anne have to die?

No she did not, friend.

Let me ask you now -

Did my Anne have to die?

Not before her time.

War took her -

God did not.

---<--@

War took her from our midst. And the promise that she stood for was taken away from us.

It is a strange remembrance indeed to make up for her life by propagating the spirit of War in our times and at all times.

The spirit of revenge will attempt to remember my Anne by the same hatred that swept her little world away.

Strange remembrance indeed.

Lukewarm souls will attempt to comfort themselves with the thought that all things in War are meant to be, that they are set in stone, and that we are ever powerless, or in other words that my Anne was destined to die by the hand of the Adversary of God.

Strange remembrance indeed.

To honor my Anne is to remember what her hopes were - not her fears.

Now, if we were to confront those same fears with her hopes joined with ours, we remember my Anne as she was - as she is.

When we make this world of ours a better place little by little, our most beloved Starshine, we take back what promise was lost to each of us by the insufferable hand of War.

Because Peace is the responsibility of all.

If one were to become aware of the suffering of every innocent who was ever lost to our nations through War, one would lose the will to continue on hoping...

Manong Jose

Cosmopolitan!

A Global Filipino -

that's Jose Rizal.

Remember Rizal

and his great generation

and believe again...

...in Peace and

brotherhood.

---<--@

José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda (18610619-18961230 of valor and love of Country, illustrious hero of the one Filipino nation, martyred scion of the one Republic of the Philippines, beloved son, brother, compatriot via on Dios.)

Equality is not a singularity.

If all our cultures were the same, we wouldn't be a family of nations. If all human beings were the same, we wouldn't be nations at all.

Every nation has something to bring to the table. Every person has something to share. This is why we are so arrayed as one family of nations and as nations distinct but not apart from each other respectively.

Remembrance as Virtue

Remember Now,

my brothers and sisters of the Promise -

Our remembrance is a virtue.

It is born from the cardinal virtue of Justice.

One who is guided by remembrance

can not be by evil inspired.

For no virtue may be used for evil purposes.

Remembrance does not serve

to throw the present into the confusion of the past.

It serves to add to the momentum of the present

the present hopes of every generation past.

If the present seem dim, O my nation,

it is because the future seem distant.

And the future seem distant

because the glories of the past is somewhere forgot.

Remember the good things and build upon it.

Remember the evil things

and let this lead you to a remembrance of the good things.

Never build upon evil inspiration.

It is not remembrance to hold on to a hatred of past misdeeds

and remain in thrall of the gravity of War.

For what redeems is virtue sufficient for every generation.

By virtue the long night is overcome.

---<--@

June 19, 2011 is the 150th Birthday of Manong Jose.

The Bridge

I saw the bridge - there -
spanning the abyss, yonder.
And I thought, "O LORD..."

"Thou made us nations
not to make us differ - but -
to make us agree."

To build peace
and bridge war.

---<--@

Fiery Flower

The fiery flower
shook against thy innocence,
and in an instant -

Thy blossoms, they fell,
and lay still upon the cold,
awaiting the spring.

The war thawed,
life lingers.
---<--@

Farewell to Promise

Farewell to promise,
the sun has set, it is dark,
and the night ponders...

Bittersweet the fruit
that once fallen, in dying -
remembers, remains...

resting, here,
with our hope.
---<--@

Tree of Remembrance

My life touching yours -

living, belonging, reaching,

growing together.

Your life touching mine -

living, belonging, reaching,

growing together.

Forever.

We belong.

---<--@

Excerpted from Planet Annelies, 20100825 -

You know, that chestnut tree of yours, my loveliest Miyang, fell over a couple of days ago.

In spite of efforts to preserve it, my darling, it was toppled by a storm.

The tree was simply too old, my love, but the timeless substance of what it now represents - if we are vigilant at heart and if we ponder about it here within - may only be multiplied by this act of God.

That old chestnut tree represents (yes, in present tense) your hope for better things, you know. And because this is a hope that is shared by all of humanity, it has a definite resonance that can not be toppled by any temporal storm.

So why not plant a new one, my darling, nurture it through the years, and let the generations (of our one family of nations) rally themselves in time through it?

Let us plant a lineage of these trees to stretch to the shores of forever and let our allied generations be fostered by it.

After all, remembrance is forever. Remembrance is what holds vigil over the sheltering wings of our peace as nations. If the tree speaks of remembrance, it can never be toppled.

Update: Apparently, a number of new saplings were taken from the old tree, my darling, and was a thing thought of independent of our suggestion here (which only reinforces our point).

---<--@

Nation Like Trees

A tree that is good
bears its fruit not for itself
and therefore, prospers.

A nation is like -

a tree! One lineage of hope.

Bearing fruit for all.

One people,

one spirit.

---<--@