Aberjhani quotes:

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  • The Civil Rights Act of 1964 laid the foundation for the Voting Rights Act of 1965, but it also addressed nearly every other aspect of daily life in a would-be free democratic society.

  • Minister and writer Barbara Kaufmann has addressed the subject of guerrilla decontextualization on both the 'Voices Compassionate Education' website and on 'Inner Michael', where she offers the kind of insights into the spiritual aspects of Michael Jackson's creative artistry that mainstream media mostly ignores.

  • Most of the more celebrated names among African-American authors, poets, and artists are known to the world because of their association with specific cultural arts movements.

  • The study of history empowers nations and individuals with an ability to avoid errors of the past and lay foundations for victories in the future.

  • Because Mr. Mandela's early opponents invested so many resources into distorting the true nature of his advocacy, the singular historic moment millions now celebrate could have been tragically lost to guerrilla decontextualization.

  • The political, social, and spiritual impact of the life example set by Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela might be measured in part by the profound and unique gestures made by people in different countries to honor his life upon learning of his death.

  • Classic romantic love is an emotional attraction between two individuals in which they may share a heightened awareness of mutual adoration. Erotic love, traditionally, has been described as shared sexual attraction.

  • Valentine's Day itself, like most holidays in the modern era, has been heavily influenced by commercialism that focuses on the appeal of romantic fantasies.

  • Mainstream media's representation, or its guerrilla decontextualization, of black men's lives in particular can set the stage for erroneous assumptions capable of damaging an individual or a nation.

  • Quote words that affirmall men and women are yourbrothers and sisters.

  • Discourse and critical thinking are essential tools when it comes to securing progress in a democratic society. But in the end, unity and engaged participation are what make it happen.

  • Beneath the armor of skin/and/bone/and/mindmost of our colors are amazingly the same.

  • Varieties of angels, like varieties of love, are many.

  • Many people can rightfully claim, as much as anyone can rightfully claim anything, that much of their lives have been spent stumbling through a cloud of cluelessness.

  • How many fears came between us?Earthquakes, diseases, wars where hellrained smoldering pus from skies made of winged death.Horror tore this world asunder.While inside the bleeding smokeand beyond the shredded weeping fleshwe memorized tales of infinite good.--from The History Lesson

  • Millions cheer the warriorspilling blood across the ringwhile the one who stands for peaceis ridiculed and shamed.Must hearts forever sufferfrom ignorance and greed?Can bombs heal our soulsor set our spirits free?

  • Authentic inspiration endows individuals with mental or spiritual energy which they are then able to transform into positive action. It can make all the difference between a man, woman, or child allowing despair to permanently paralyze any dreams they may have for their lives, or, exercising sufficient strength of will to make those dreams a reality.

  • Movies can provide tear-inducing or comically-entertaining representations of love, but many agree that its deeper conflicting complexities often seem unfathomable.

  • Just above our terror, the stars painted this storyin perfect silver calligraphy. And our souls, too oftenabused by ignorance, covered our eyes with mercy.

  • The acknowledgement of a single possibility can change everything.

  • History is a hermaphrodite with many distinguished lovers. We are neither mysteries nor strangers but the living breath of revelation made flesh by the unrestrained desires of a free and universal love. Universal me. Universal you."--from Past Present and Future are One"

  • Diversity is an aspect of human existence that cannot be eradicated by terrorism or war or self-consuming hatred. It can only be conquered by recognizing and claiming the wealth of values it represents for all.

  • On either side of a potentially violent conflict, an opportunity exists to exercise compassion and diminish fear based on recognition of each other's humanity. Without such recognition, fear fueled by uninformed assumptions, cultural prejudice, desperation to meet basic human needs, or the panicked uncertainty of the moment explodes into violence.

  • If the idea of loving those whom you have been taught to recognize as your enemies is too overwhelming, consider more deeply the observation that we are all much more alike than we are unalike.

  • Individual cultures and ideologies have their appropriate uses but none of them erase or replace the universal experiences, like love and weeping and laughter, common to all human beings.

  • Peace is not so much a political mandate as it is a shared state of consciousness that remains elevated and intact only to the degree that those who value it volunteer their existence as living examples of the samePeace ends with the unraveling of individual hope and the emergence of the will to worship violence as a healer of private and social dis-ease.

  • In a rich moonlit garden, flowers open beneath the eyes of entire nations terrified to acknowledge the simplicity of the beauty of peace.

  • This rose of pearl-coated infinity transformsthe diseased slums of a broken heartinto a palace made of psalms and gold.

  • Then came the healing time, hearts started to shine, soul felt so fine, oh what a freeing time it was.

  • Now come the whispersbearing bouquets of moonbeamsand sunlight tremblings."

  • The ecstatic beauty and soulful grace of Rumi's poetry inspires human hearts to believe in possibilities beyond the predictably fatal."

  • This rose of pearl-coated infinity transformsthe diseased slums of a broken heartinto a palace made of psalms and gold."

  • Because Mr. Mandelas early opponents invested so many resources into distorting the true nature of his advocacy, the singular historic moment millions now celebrate could have been tragically lost to guerrilla decontextualization.

  • Got just enough room to be a friend of yours. Oh I hope you got room to be a friend of mine.

  • The literary artist lends verbal depth to the visual. The visual artist provides visible articulation for the literary.

  • If life is a birthday cake let my face be smeared with its icing of cognac and kindness.

  • Valentines Day itself, like most holidays in the modern era, has been heavily influenced by commercialism that focuses on the appeal of romantic fantasies.

  • With its leaves so rich and heavy with elation and its crimson face made brighter with visions of divinity the shadow of a certain rose looks just like an angel eating light.

  • At the edge of madness you howl diamonds and pearls.

  • The Emancipation Proclamation...can remind us in 2013 of all the mistakes we never want to commit again but it can also motivate us to fulfill to an ever greater degree the definitive freedom-sustaining and life-enhancing principles of democracy in living action.

  • The fact that an African American sits in the White House at the helm of government in the United States of America on this 150th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation represents both phenomenal political symbolism and a victory of faith in democracy that should not be lost on any American.

  • The death of a dream can in fact serve as the vehicle that endows it with new form, with reinvigorated substance, a fresh flow of ideas, and splendidly revitalized color. In short, the power of a certain kind of dream is such that death need not indicate finality at all but rather signify a metaphysical and metaphorical leap forward.

  • First steps are always the hardest but until they are taken the notion of progress remains only a notion and not an achievement.

  • The birth of a true poet is neither an insignificant event nor an easy delivery. Complications generally begin long before the fated soul carries its dubious light into whatever womb has been kind enough to volunteer the intricate machinery of its blood and prayers and muscles for a gestation period much longer than nine months or even nine years.

  • We are living in an era in which billions of people are grappling to promote communication, tolerance, and understanding over the more destructive forces of war, terrorism, and political chaos that have characterized the beginning of the 21st Century.

  • When reading about what may be described as the lesser celebrated heroic figures of the Harlem Renaissance, we rarely get a definitive look at just how complicated and sometimes dangerous their everyday lives were. In fact, until the past ten years, many defined the period primarily by its well-known literary, musical, and artistic elements while overlooking the fact there was any political component to it at all.

  • The best of humanity's recorded history is a creative balance between horrors endured and victories achieved, and so it was during the Harlem Renaissance.

  • Mixtape' is a very appropriate word to include in the title of Goran Hugo Olsson's film because it includes a rich mixture of cultural voices. They speak across different dividing lines such as those of haves and have-nots, youth and maturity, black and white, national and global, and the past and the present.

  • Peace is not so much a political mandate as it is a shared state of consciousness that remains elevated and intact only to the degree that those who value it volunteer their existence as living examples of the same... Peace ends with the unraveling of individual hope and the emergence of the will to worship violence as a healer of private and social dis-ease.

  • Stars ink your fingers with a lexicon of flame blazing rare knowledge.

  • Journey through the Power of the Rainbow represents a condensed compendium of literary efforts from a life dedicated to transforming the themes of injustice, grief, and despair that we all encounter during some unavoidable point of our existence into a sustainable life-affirming poetics of passionate creativity, empowered spiritual vision, and inspired commitment.

  • Poetry looking in the mirror sees art, and art looking in a mirror sings poetry.

  • Searching for a mind long lost I found it shaping colors and history near the cliffs of your heart.

  • Shine your soul with the same egoless humility as the rainbow and no matter where you go in this world or the next, love will find you, attend you, and bless you.

  • Millions of tears have fallen for black sons, brothers, lovers, and friends whose assailants took or maimed their lives and then simply went on their way.

  • Careful studies of cases dealing with supposed 'mental disorder' have at times revealed that many thought to be insane or warped in some fashion were actually simply highly sensitive individuals. What they suffered from was not mental debilitation, but personal and communal ignorance of psychic reality.

  • The issue, perhaps, boils down to one of how perceptions or misperceptions of racial difference impact various 'individuals', or groups of 'individuals', experience of freedom in America. Some would argue that it goes beyond hampering their "pursuit of happiness" to outright obliterating it.

  • Now come the whispers bearing bouquets of moonbeams and sunlight tremblings.

  • In a world gushing blood day and night, you never stop mopping up pain.

  • Human beings, in a sense, may be thought of as multidimensional creatures composed of such poetic considerations as the individual need for self-realization, subdued passions for overwhelming beauty, and a hunger for meaning beyond the flavors that enter and exit the physical body. A person might even be described as a self-contained multiverse.

  • Before the thunderous clamor of political debate or war set loose in the world, love insisted on its promise for the possibility of human unity: between men and women, between blacks and whites, northerners and southerners, haves and have-have-nots, self and self.

  • By consciously meditating upon spiritual truths and cultivating personal integrity, one need never fear negative circumstances.

  • Ours is an age in which thousands are driven daily from their homelands by the unforgiving brutalities of war, terrorism, political oppression, starvation, disease, economic piracy, and the relentless suffocation of that singular breath which makes human beings individuals.

  • It becomes more and more difficult to avoid the idea of black men as subjects of not just racial profiling but of an insidious form of racial obliteration sanctioned by silence.

  • A man sitting monkey-like on the rooftop of his brain is due the applause such feats earn him.

  • In an age when nations and individuals routinely exchange murder for murder, when the healing grace of authentic spirituality is usurped by the divisive politics of religious organizations, and when broken hearts bleed pain in darkness without the relief of compassion, the voice of an exceptional poet producing exceptional work is not something the world can afford to dismiss.

  • When the lyrical muse sings the creative pen dances.

  • Each star is a mirror reflecting the truth inside you.

  • Most people are slow to champion love because they fear the transformation it brings into their lives. And make no mistake about it: love does take over and transform the schemes and operations of our egos in a very mighty way.

  • Dare to love yourselfas if you were a rainbowwith gold at both ends.

  • Un-winged and naked, sorrow surrenders its crown to a throne called grace.

  • Even when muddy your wings sparkle bright wonders that heal broken worlds.

  • To create art with all the passion in one's soul is to live art with all the beauty in one's heart.

  • This fire that we call Loving is too strong for human minds. But just right for human souls.

  • A bridge of silver wings stretches from the dead ashes of an unforgiving nightmareto the jeweled vision of a life started anew.

  • Compassion crowns the soul with its truest victory.

  • Love, Mercy, and Grace, sisters all, attend your wounds of silence and hope.

  • With my ninth mind I resurrect my firstand dance slow to the music of my soul made new.

  • Love as a concrete foundation for an authentically functional civilization requires the around-the-clock labors of forgiveness. Without it, Love fails, Friendship fails, Intelligence fails, Humanity: fails.

  • Souls reconstructed with faith transform agony into peace.

  • In this quiet place on a quiet streetwhere no one ever finds usgently, lovingly, freedom gives back our pain.--from poem In a Quiet Place on a Quiet Street

  • Poetry and art nourish the soul of the world with the flavor-filled substances of beauty, wisdom and truth.

  • Time (again, Time) like the soul, wears many faces, many bodies and climates and attitudes. The past is one face, the present a second and the future yet another.

  • Passion presented with a greater challenge achieves a greater goal.-- from The Sexual Side of Spirituality

  • You are the hybrids of golden worlds and ages splendidly conceived.

  • Know yourself fearlessly (even quietly) for all the things you are.

  • I place my fingers upon these keys typing 2,000 dreams per minute and naked of spirit dance forth my cosmic vortex upon this crucifix called language.

  • Trayvon Martin, at the most, seems only to have been guilty of being himself.

  • Knowledge planted in truth grows in truth.Strength born of peace loses nothing to hate.

  • Change is one of the scariest things in the world and yet it is also one of those variables of human existence that no one can avoid.

  • We can cry for years but sometimes gotta smile too.

  • In your hands winteris a book with cloud pagesthat snow pearls of love.

  • The reality of a serious writer is a reality of many voices, some of them belonging to the writer, some of them belonging to the world of readers at large.

  • Hearts rebuilt from hope resurrect dreams killed by hate.

  • In an age of bombsguzzling blood, skylarks merge peacewith thought and action.

  • The music of revelation announces itself to the reader in somber brooding tones or in melodies light as air and one is invited to dance with the most captivating of partners: poetry.

  • And now we step to the rhythm of miracles.--from The Light, That Never Dies

  • What hell condemned, let heaven now heal.

  • Poetry, like jazz, is one of those dazzling diamonds of creative industry that help human beings make sense out of the comedies and tragedies that contextualize our lives.

  • The dancing vortex of a sacred metaphor clashes horns and halos to make wounded music set to the tempo of a new era in brilliant labor.

  • Life possesses an amazing array of profoundly sad faces.

  • Some have speculated that the way [Albert] Camus died made his theories on absurdity a self-fulfilling prophecy. Others would say it was the triumphant meaningful way he lived that allowed him to rise heroically above absurdity.

  • President Obama appears to me to have elevated and implemented the artist-activist concept to the role of empowered servant-leader...

  • By striving so mightily to accomplish specific goals on behalf of one segment of humanity, she [Toni Morrison] went beyond them to create literary wonders capable of enriching the lives of not just her own people, but of all people.

  • True lovers earn their genius in schools of blood, prophecy and dust.

  • The passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 represented precisely such a hope - that America had learned from its past and acted to secure a better tomorrow.

  • At some point, a flash of sustained clarity reveals the difference between what someone would have you believe is true, and what you know from the depths of your own heart to the peaks of your soul to be true. What happens after that is up to you.

  • The more sincere the soul, the heavier the cross endured.

  • Rainbows introduce us to reflections of different beautiful possibilities so we never forget that pain and grief are not the final options in life.

  • Oh what a wonderful soul so bright inside you. Got power to heal the sunâ??s broken heart, power to restore the moonâ??s vision too.

  • In honor of Oprah Winfrey: Even greater than the ability to inspire others with hope is the power to motivate them to give as much to the lives of others as they would give to their own; and to empower them to confront the worst in themselves in order to discover and claim the best in themselves.

  • What a loverâ??s heart knows let no manâ??s brain dispute.

  • A world without poetry and art would be too much like one without birds or flowers: bearable but a lot less enjoyable.

  • Within the universe of the extraordinary, those qualities we designate to human concepts of gender are often shared, exchanged, or even completely obliterated. Because of this mixture of traits, these twins called Genius and Madness often appear to be the same thing. They both have a tendency to blur the lines of what we call norms, or established reality. They both, when we study that grand tapestry known as history and modern-day society, tend to stand out in much bolder relief than other figures. -- from Dancing with Madness, Dancing with Genius

  • An outrageous instinct to love and be loved blinded your arms to lines of proprietyâ??â??Women and Men, Christians and Jews, Muslims and Buddhists, white, black, red, brown. An outrageous instinct to love and be loved executed your brain every hour on the hour.

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