Bittersweet
()
About this ebook
Related to Bittersweet
Related ebooks
Empathy Prescribed Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsObvious Intentions Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBeyond the Void: Where My Voice Is Heard 10 Times Clearer to Those Who Feel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOpen Doors Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPoetry from the Heart Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEbullience Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsI'm Thinking of a Master Plan. Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRendezvous with Life Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe C Word: Children. When love is not enough. Life after the baby debate. Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Layman Speaks Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRealism: These Are My Spoken Words Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsControlling Misadventures: The Darkness Within That No One Discusses Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBeyond the Rainbow Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOlder Women Don’t Giggle: Memoirs of a Renaissance Man Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBack to the Garden Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsReturning Home: My Journey of a Lifetime Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsInner Sanctuary: Lifetime Musings of a Poet Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSome Women Don't Live on High Heels Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn Other Words: Poems and Musings Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDaph and Ern’s Adventures Finding Yourself on the Road: A Beginner’s Journey of Self-Discovery… and Other Funny Stories. Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Valley: In Order to Reach Your Mountaintop, You Have to Go Through Your Valley! Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEse: The Misadventures of Moving Forward Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThoughts of a Young Black Man Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Time to Heal Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClimb into My Mind: A Book of Poems, Essays, and Short Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPhilosophy with Chickens and Ducks Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPoetry of a Dreamey World Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLife Defining Poems: The 2Nd Half! Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIdentity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOne Reason Why Not To Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Poetry For You
Heart Talk: Poetic Wisdom for a Better Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Love Her Wild: Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You Better Be Lightning Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Pillow Thoughts II: Healing the Heart Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Way Forward Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Inward Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Selected Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beyond Thoughts: An Exploration Of Who We Are Beyond Our Minds Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Dante's Inferno: The Divine Comedy, Book One Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Daily Stoic: A Daily Journal On Meditation, Stoicism, Wisdom and Philosophy to Improve Your Life Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bedtime Stories for Grown-ups Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Odyssey: (The Stephen Mitchell Translation) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Works Of Oscar Wilde Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Dream Work Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tao Te Ching: A New English Version Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Odyssey Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLeaves of Grass: 1855 Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Twenty love poems and a song of despair Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Gilgamesh: A New English Version Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatory, and Paradise Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5For colored girls who have considered suicide/When the rainbow is enuf Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of John Keats (with an Introduction by Robert Bridges) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Road Not Taken and other Selected Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (ReadOn Classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Prophet Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Divine Comedy: Inferno Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Iliad: The Fitzgerald Translation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Bittersweet
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Bittersweet - Florence Young
Copyright © 2021 Florence Young.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
iUniverse
1663 Liberty Drive
Bloomington, IN 47403
www.iuniverse.com
844-349-9409
Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
ISBN: 978-1-6632-2130-8 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-6632-2131-5 (e)
iUniverse rev. date: 04/24/2021
CONTENTS
Bittersweet
The Journey
Dream Castles
Visions
Phoenix
Walking Backwards
Farewell to Yesterday
Today
Tomorrow’s Yesterday
Bumps in the Road
Not on this Earth
I will never be that Old
Political Science
Night Watch
The Who
The Management
Waste Not—Want Not
My Guardian
Perfect Peace
Booby Trap
Make Your Own Decision
Belief
Take Care of Your Checking Account
A Box of Crayons
Wisdom at its Peak
Dangerous Sundown
Perception Limits Reality
Scammed!
He will Never Leave You
Solitude
Acceptable Worship
Peace Beyond Understanding
A Different Drum
The Search
Values—Yours or Borrowed
Broken Trust
Relationships
All Those Pretty Things
Get Up and Get Going
Driftwood
Ready? Set? Wait
Time Bomb
The Affair
Custody
My Plea
When Forgiving Becomes Enabling
My Self Untouched
When You Come to the End of the Day
Disconnected
Road Closed
What God Cannot Do
No Return to Where You Were
For What You Can Become
Torn Asunder
Love One Another
Your Shelter, My Prison
The Prisoner
Married
Red Roses
The Meeting
Unequally Yoked
The Wasteland of Indifference
Square Pegs in Square Holes
On Being a Mother
Exclusion
Heart Cry
What Goes Around Comes Around
The Long Good-Bye
Tears
You Can Take it with You
Grief, The Healer
The Healing
September 11, 2001
Prisoner of War
Victim Suit
Counterweight
Victim Suit
The Brass Ring
Looking for Fair
Friends
Friendship
Finis
My Friend, the Enemy
The Aristocracy
Politician
Why Believe in God?
Who Are You, God?
Come to Me
A Firm Foundation
God Knows Who I Am
In the Beginning God
My God and I
Vacancy
Psalm 139:13-18
Perfect Gifts
Deliver Us From Evil
Unfinished
Where Do I Go From Here?
Always
A Reason to get Up in the Morning
God’s Grace
Accept God’s Forgiveness
The Traveler
Freedom in the Negative
Come to Me
You Are Here
Resistance
BITTERSWEET
Life
You were once my lover
passionate
full of promise
You spoke of a fabulous forever
Come go with me
you said
We will dance the years away together
Passion cooled
Come then you said
Be my friend
Hand in hand we will walk the pleasant years away
Life
My erstwhile lover
My sometime friend
Your promises were ropes of sand
White hot passion denied reality
Warm companionship belied actuality
Not a whisper you gave
of grief
of tears
of shattered dreams
The dancing ended
The walk slowed to a trudge
But I would not turn you away
Your quiet whisper speaks
of lessons learned
of wisdom gained
of time now
To begin the business of living
Life
I bear you no grudge
for empty expectations
for unfulfilled anticipation
We will finish the years together in quiet joy
Until that last goodnight
THE JOURNEY
Seems I’m always swimming upstream
While those
the drifters in placid waters
Dawdle peacefully
seeming to feel no pain
What is so exciting upstream
worthy of the struggle
Will I know when I have arrived
Will I find what I think I am seeking
upstream
So I continue on my journey
asking
never answering
Afraid perhaps
to learn of empty exertion
But fearing more the loss
of never having begun
DREAM CASTLES
D REAMS COME IN ALL SHAPES and sizes, but they are your dreams. Build your own dream castles and rely on no one else for your visions of the future. Dream castles are not duplexes.
Langston Hughes said it: Hold fast to dreams for if dreams die life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly.
The young have wonderful dreams of the future, of being able to work in an exciting profession as they perform great and wonderful things for the benefit of mankind. As the years go by life delivers some disappointments. Perhaps there is no viable chance for the realization of your dream, but life holds many surprises.
An accident can end your dream. In that case grieve for what can never be. Then find a new dream for the new life that has been handed to you.
For many college graduation is the realization of their dream. But time and unexpected events can put a finish to that dream. If that is still your dream put forth every effort to make it come true. One class at a time can move you forward. Slowly, but at least you are working on your dream. College credits do not lose their value and can often be transferred to another college. Even after a long dropout it is possible to pick up where you left off and fulfill your dream.
Dream castles add sparkle to life. But if your dreams are obviously without a whisper of the possibilities of fulfillment do not be afraid to shift to other dreams.
Dream castles, filled with your very own dreams, lift you above the ho-hum of simply following your feet around. An exciting what if
can help to change your outlook on life from bitter to sweet.
A young college professor truly enjoyed his teaching career, but circumstances destroyed that dream castle. His marriage dissolved. He found joy in directing stage productions for high school students. Years brought an end to that pleasant interlude.
He remarried, happily—or so he believed. They relocated for her benefit where he managed her well-paid business in counseling troubled young people. With no warning she left him to marry someone else leaving him with no house and little income from part-time work at a local college.
Too many disappointments and the death of too many dreams threatened to destroy him. Hopefully, he rebuilt an old dream castle and began to write. To his surprise and delight royalty checks augmented his income. Approaching the elder years of his life he continues to write.
Dream castles can vanish into thin air. Life threatens to become a wasteland of abandoned or destroyed dream castles. Find another dream if it is no more than what you would do if you won the lottery. Find a cause that can use your help and build your new dream castle on that foundation. There is no shortage of dreams.
VISIONS
Unfulfilled desires
Shattered expectations
Something within me dies
every time I whisper farewell
to another broken dream
How many dreams can die
How many parts of me
discarded with each shattered hope
Can renew themselves
In yet another possibility
Tantalized
I cling
To one more
and then once more
Brain creation
Always a prisoner of hope
PHOENIX
I stood weeping
amid shattered hopes
These my broken dreams
shards and fragments
Of unrealized expectations
And unfulfilled anticipations
Then I stooped and carefully placed
One jagged shard against another
and then another
and another
A pattern heretofore unseen
Emerged
In unexpected beauty
I wonder at my weeping
Scarce recalling now
Those distant dying dreams
WALKING BACKWARDS
T HE PAST CREATES A PRISON for those who live there. As surely as iron bars imprison the lawbreaker the past holds those who refuse to let it go.
The