Tag: Unconditional Love

History, Literature, Memoirs

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I watch the news, and think of my parents, and the history they lived through. My father taught history, and my mother taught English composition and literature. Both volunteered after they retired. I am constantly learning more about history, as more stories are told and heard. Books written. Through literature, we can also understand more. There are novels and books of poetry on my shelves written from places I am not likely to visit.

My parents had “big picture faith” and majored in unconditional love. I was 29 years old when my father died, and 50 when my mother died. My brother’s passing was last year. We shall meet again.

And I am grateful for our blogs. I have learned of art online and books by contemporary authors and artists. This is a good way to grow.

This week we donated old clothes to the Good As New Resale Shop in Cedar Grove, Wisconsin.

Last year, we enjoyed giving copies of Quiet Christmas Poetry to Little Free Libraries in the general area. There is a Little Free Library site.

far from perfect
and in need of grace
we found our way
to unconditional love

old paintings
words from my parents
still encourage me

beautiful with
and without flowers
vase from my mother

Images: AntiqueClipart.com

Trumpet Vines and Time

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how the
trumpet vines
grew on the wall
of my mother’s home
glorious
like her faith
her unconditional love
when God said
“It’s time…”

August 11, 2010

My poem was also published in Bell’s Letters 135, February 2011.

Love endures and grows beyond grief. I am grateful every day.

Ellen Grace Olinger

Photo by Brad Wilkins on Pexels.com

Memory, Beauty, Hope

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When we began this blog in December 2009, and the first years here, I reflected often on the caregiving years with my mother. I am so grateful for those years.

One of the many things I learned was to look for beauty. Those lessons still apply today. We may have been in a hospital room – and look at the autumn beauty. We were near where my mother taught for years. She knew.

Two poems from my archives, in loving memory and gratitude:

another year
has passed since
my mother’s passing
I sit and quietly read
a book she would like too

country cemetery
trumpet vines
growing taller
than the gravestones

“country cemetery” was published in Time Of Singing, 2012.

Photo by Anthony on Pexels.com

Easter And Spring Poetry

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Easter And Spring Poetry is a small site where I am creating some posts for Lent and Easter 2020. Some of your favorite poems are shared again. Last year, I posted there from February to May 2019. I will see what poems I have written since then that may be good to reprint in a new way as well. And perhaps even some new poems!

morning light
forms part of a cross
on the wood wall
my faith completes
the picture

L  ove
E  verlasting
N  ot
T  emporary

LENT acrostic poem

These are photos from wpclipart, a good education resource.

Poems are by Ellen Grace Olinger.

they can return

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they can return
in new and different ways
some of the things
thought lost

my mother and I were
closer in her old age
though we always loved
language and books

a past illness led to me
simply sitting with her
for hours as that was
something I could do

conversations
the trust that grows
through decades
of unconditional love

now sometimes
these many years
since her passing
I remember what she said
and the advice still applies

Ellen Grace Olinger