this week runs over with strong feelings and pounding hearts #HearOurPrayer

Progress, Prosperity and Hope

by Stan Faryna

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This week. Like a overflowing cup, this week runs over with strong feelings and pounding hearts.

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Imogen Heap, Just For Now

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Sorrow and tears were shared. But also kindness and at least one smile. Or two. And prose – if it is not poetry – made certain demand upon me.

Please visit the awesome bloggers (Jayme Soulati and Kaarina Dillabough) who are kind and generous to allow me to guest post and share words of hope and happy.

The Happy Friday Series: A Chat With Pooh

What If Today You Got More Than You Asked For?

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And the prose?

Bear with me. This too shall pass. Quickly.
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Progress, Prosperity and Hope

I stretched out my hand to poetry
this early morning
and I felt the distance grow between words
and understanding.
Were those miles there before I had begun?
Like glass shattering, the shards scattering
across the kitchen floor; like a people
fleeing, retreating
from a more perfect union – but they say
Lincoln’s a poet and poetry mends
hearts, ways, hopes, families, neighborhoods and peoples.
That would be progress!
Or prosperous by any other name.

Technology, commerce, innovation –
cannot tow a star-faring ship of state
up a creek like a stubborn juggernaut.

Yes, star-faring ship –
that is what I wrote!

The seas are sailed
and the seas run red.
The shining cities
of Mars
are not soon enough
nor the Orion
starports blinking in their ochre glory.

At dock, hum the engines of Enterprise,
ready to carry our hopes even further.

Beyond poetry. Fiction. And Boston.

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Stan Faryna
19 April 2013
Fairfax, Virginia

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Recent blog posts:

Beauty, Come and Get Some

Freedom is Solid

Season 3 Finale of The Walking Dead

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Click and buy the mug shown below and help feed kids.

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The Inaugural Speech of President Barack Obama

Times are changing by Bob Dylan
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The Inaugural Speech of President Barack Obama

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

My fellow citizens,

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

To American Veterans: Thank you and God bless!

Below, American Soldier by Toby Keith
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Veterans Day

As Veterans Day fast approaches, I have found myself reflecting on the service and sacrifice of American men and woman who have served, and now serve, our much blessed Nation. In war time and peace, their service and valor have been a cornerstone in our cause for Freedom, progress and prosperity. From the first shots at Concord in 1775 to the peacekeepers of Enduring Freedom, our veterans have served us valiantly.

We owe them all a great debt of gratitude and many thanks.

Thank you and God bless.

In celebration of American veterans, I am posting the complete lyrics of the National Anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner and a youtube video of the anthem by the academy choirs.

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The Star-Spangled Banner

O! say can you see by the dawn’s early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming.
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O’er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming.
And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
‘Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh long may it wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war’s desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav’n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: ‘In God is our trust.’
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

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Stan Faryna
November 7, 2008
Washington, D.C.

Barack Obama, Thomas Jefferson, Lincoln, et al: Viva la Vida

Friday, 04 July 2008

As I reflect on the meaning of Independence Day, I cannot help but to see the stark contrast between the freedoms which we as Americans have come to take for granted and the situation in Romania, where the Romanian people struggle to live day by day under the capricious and self-serving will of oligarchs and authoritarians and a corrupt and impetuous government.

Never you mind that the 2008 NATO Summit was held in Bucharest.

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We the people of the United States, in order to form a

more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic

tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote

the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty

to ourselves and our posterity…

United States Constitution

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The purpose of human government is to enable the people to obtain, individually, for themselves every good and moral opportunity to pursue and enjoy the common good.

Regardless of geographical differences, the purpose is everywhere the same. This, the human spirit has taught us in its longings, triumphs, and struggles through human history. And this wisdom is made more compelling by our own tears, hopes and prayers.

George Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Martin Luther King, Jr. understood themselves as instruments of human destiny. They saw that the implications of their efforts, sacrifices and triumphs were not limited to their time; they understood that the things for which they struggled for must also belong in a wider sense to humanity and the future.