I am reminded of the beautiful words of the Arabian proverb:
"A friend is one to whom one may pour out all the contents of one's heart, chaff and grain together, knowing that the gentlest of hands will take and sift it, keep what is worth keeping, and with a breath of kindness, blow the rest away."
And also of Roy Croft:
"I love you, not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you.
I love you, not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me.
I love you for the part of me that you bring out;
I love you for putting your hand into my heaped-up heart, and passing over all the foolish, weak things that you can't help dimly seeing there, and for drawing out into the light, all the beautiful belongings that no one else had looked quite far enough to find.
I love you because you are helping me to make of the lumber of my life, not a tavern, but a temple;
Out of works of my every day, not a reproach but a song.
I love you because you have done more than any creed could have done to make me good, and more than any fate could have done to make me happy.
You have done it without a touch, without a word, without a sign.
You have done it by being yourself. Perhaps that is what being a friend means, after all."
Thank you; thank you all.
Beautiful words.
ReplyDeleteI love this prayer by Max Coots, the emeritus minister of the Unitarian Universalist church in Canton, New York. It is called “Let Us Give Thanks.”
PRAYER: “Let Us Give Thanks,”
by Max Coots
Let us give thanks for a bounty of people.
For children who are our second planting, and, though they grow like weeds and the wind too soon blows them away, may they forgive us our cultivation and fondly remember where their roots are.
Let us give thanks:
For generous friends, with hearts and smiles as bright as their blossoms;
For feisty friends as tart as apples;
For continuous friends who, like scallions and cucumbers, keep reminding us that we’ve had them.
For crotchety friends, as sour as rhubarb and as indestructible;
For handsome friends, who are as gorgeous as eggplants and as elegant as a row of corn, and the others, as plain as potatoes and as good for you;
For funny friends, who are as silly as Brussels sprouts and as amusing as Jerusalem artichokes, and serious friends, as complex as cauliflowers and as intricate as onions;
For friends as unpretentious as cabbages, as subtle as summer squash, as persistent as parsley, as delightful as dill, as endless as zucchini, and who, like parsnips, can be counted on to see you throughout the winter;
For old friends, nodding like sunflowers in the evening-time, and young friends coming on as fast as radishes;
For loving friends, who wind around us like tendrils and hold us, despite our blights, wilts, and witherings;
And, finally, for those friends now gone, like gardens past that have been harvested, and who fed us in their times that we might have life thereafter.
For all these, we give thanks.
Thank you Yvonne - love it. Sue
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