I love literary arts…this is a great topic looking forward to taking some time and reading everything
Me too @Don_Cocan, me too.
I have trouble getting my thoughts from my head into speech but I can communicate better in writing. Words on a page speak to me on a different level.
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I agree,same here
What i do want to say is that it has become easier to use the same finesse j have with writing in speaking the longer I stay clean
It’ll come!
I hope you’re write (see what I did there?) 
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A butterfly is a symbol of Hope; of a new life.
It must spend it’s time as a caterpillar in a cocoon, struggling to free itself (from hurt, anger, grief) and one day to emerge (beautiful, strong, compassionate, understanding, changed) as a butterfly.
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Our thoughts become reality. Focus on the solution, not the problem. Focus on gratitude for what you do have, not what you don’t. Focus on happiness and health today, not mistakes of yesterday. Focus on progress and transformation, not self-loathing and unattainable perfection.
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7 Cardinal Rules of Life
Make peace with your past
so it won’t disturb your present
What other people think of you
is none of your business
Time heals almost everything
Give it time
No one is in charge of your happiness
Except you and Accept You
Don’t compare your life to others
and don’t judge them. You have no idea what their journey is all about
Stop thinking too much
It’s alright not to know the answers. They will come to you when you least expect it.
Smile
You don’t own all the problems in the world.
Be grateful that you have survived 100% of everything you’ve been through.
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Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, everything is different.
-C.S. Lewis
A lion never loses sleep over the opinions of sheep
Be kinder than necessary.
Everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.
The only person you should try being better than, is the person you were yesterday.
The soul would have no rainbow had the eye no tears
Hardships often prepare ordinary people for extraordinary events
When it rains, look for rainbows.
When it’s dark, look for stars.
Inner peace begins the moment I choose not to allow another person or event control my emotions. I will not be a sponge to negativity.
I am responsible for how I act, no matter how I feel
The words you speak become the house you live in.
The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.
Be nice to yourself. It’s hard to be happy when someone is mean to you all of the time.
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Destroy what destroys you
Negative thinking
Fear of failure
Destructive habits
Toxic relationships
Criticism
Anger
Excessive anything
Procrastination
Laziness
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If you want a different result, make a different choice
The first step to getting what you want is having courage to get rid of what you don’t
Don’t care about how hard this is, how disappointed you are. Don’t let this get the best of you.
You are not broken, just bent
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The word LISTEN contains the same letters as the word SILENT
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Wish You Were Here" (Pink Floyd)
So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell, blue skies from pain.
Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?
Did they get you to trade your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
Did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?
How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We’re just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found?
The same old fears.
Wish you were here.
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Go on bury me. Under stone or under sea. Silent pictures keep the fishes company. There is little else for me now but I will find my way, out of the dark someday. Into a crimson yellow sun. Science fictional, when the morning comes we will, walk for light years, watch the nebulas appear. There is little else for me now but I will find my way, out of the dark someday. -the ancestor by darlingside.
I thought I could relate to the lyrics.
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@Melrm I loved reading everything you posted today. So powerful. But I’m having a hard time distinguishing your writings from quotes and excerpts from others - probably because you write so well! Can you remember to add “citation” if it’s from someone else, like you did with c.s. Lewis.
Hello, I have the problem of having to translate everything to be able to communicate with you, but I have found a song with a lot of feeling and very beautiful already translated, a hug I hope you like …
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Winning is a way of life! By me
Allow yourself to be redefined by the achievements you make today…,
So that when you find success…
It will reflect upon the self motivation that inspired you to persevere through the failures of your yesterdays,
empowering you…by providing you with the insight needed for prosperity to transpire into all of the conquest of your tomorrow’s.
Forever remembering…
That although time itself is eternal…
the only thing we truly have is the here and now,and in this moment…
where you are awarded opportunity…
you yourself might gain the merit of being distinguished as a winner.
"A person who cherishes the lessons of loss as much as they do the bounties of victory.
Never forgetting…
the hard work and dedication it took to reach their current position…
no matter where they are on their journey. "
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@Melrm & others, like I mentioned, I used to write poems and pseudo-songs to deal with life back in high school and college. Most of them were pre-addiction. This is one I wrote years later, when I was cycling between sex and alcohol addictions.
Brief background. I wrote most of it on a flight to Chicago traveling for work. It was snowing and we sat on the runway while they de-iced the plane. I was afraid, but also feeling hopeless, and started thinking maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, and at least it was a way out…
(I called it “Whiteout” as in snow storm, it’s kind of a song, but only as a tune in my head)
“Whiteout”
afraid, but accepting
this day as my last
tied up some loose ends
all we are is our past
if I opened up this window
to de-ice my frozen heart
would it still be beating
would it ever start
when I was young, I’d scan the skies
and knew every kind by name
but still they would come crashing
in my nightmares just the same
so now have I grown older?
or just bloated with infection
from all a man’s addictions
from a dying dream’s dissection
…we shuddered up the white
blizzard of the sky
my stomach folding in
just let me quickly die
and to those I leave behind
be a hero in the end
the clouds will catch my evil
to toss in unseen rain
the clouds will catch my evil
to toss in unseen rain. . . .
…but we rose above the weather
and the sun gleamed off my wing
and across a sea of cloud tops
was the blue of everything
just give me one more chance
ok, one more than the last
to rise above myself
and the whiteout of my past
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[ Recently I posted a “song” that I wrote about addiction:
(Poems, Quotes, and other Ephemera)
…I also have a number of ‘bad’ poems/songs that I wrote before my problems with addiction, starting in my high school and college years (I’m 52 now). These writings still have much to say about the root causes and defects that led to my addictions, so I will copy/paste some of them here. Yes, I was “Emo” before it was cool, and then not so cool anymore… 
]
This one was about my father who died of lung cancer from smoking, around 1995. My parents were separated as long as I can remember, but he would visit every few weeks. He spoke very little English, had some OCD issues and would clean/sweep the whole front of our house before even ringing the doorbell.
“Cracks”
they grew between the cracks
in the sidewalk of my old house
and that man was out there
pulling each one out
and by the time the weeds grew back
he’d returned armed with his own broom
so we’d drop the blinds
the doorbell would ring soon
he grew between the cracks
in my own life, between the phone calls
in the feeble soil
of words we could recall
but mom had always said
he’s your own father just the same
he gave me you
and gave you both a name
he lived between the cracks
in this country, of his exile
once a teacher
here a servent, hand for hire
yet he never would complain
and kept his pride, and every dollar
his sister got her home
and he just had tomorrow
he lived within the cracks
in the memory of a young child
a stubbled kiss
a toy, a coin, good-bye
but I could always find his love
beneath the sharpness and suspicion
when he heard our need
and would come through again
It grew from in the cracks
in the temple of God’s own design
and it wouldn’t stop
until the day he died
so I found the love, did the plans
and even made the time
but the cracks are gone
and no root was left behind
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Love reading all the stuff you guys have posted here… very nice!
I’d post my stuff but it would be kinda repetitive as a created a thread for poetry a while back 
Once again nice work! 
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