Grace in Place of Grace

This volume of simple, unpretentious poetry will hopefully direct the reader to an understanding of the marvellous and abundant grace that Jesus Christ has to offer every human being. By combining Biblical verses with the author’s thoughts, the poems shall perhaps navigate men’s hearts to an awareness of the rich mercy that Jesus wants to share with all people.

When humans have thoughts surmising Christ, what may they ask themselves? How do I get to know the Saviour of mankind? What does a life lived for Christ entail? Are there aspects of my life that I need to change? How can I have a heartfelt relationship with God’s Son?

The poems in this book shall assist you in finding what Christ wants to do in your life and what He has already done. The titles may cause readers to think questions of great importance: “I Have Chosen You,” “No Longer Earthbound,” “Leap Like a Deer,” “No One Can Tell God What to Do,” “The Effectual Fervent Prayer,” “Washed with Butter,” “Inward Parts,” “The Pathways of God’s Pleasure,” etc….

“For by grace are ye saved through faith.” Ephesians 2:8a

Good Rain

Growing up in Kansas in the summer, the air would be so thick with humidity sometimes it would be difficult to breathe. Sometimes the air would be so heavy you would hope for a good rain. After it would pour you would walk outside and everything would feel lighter, brighter, greener, and cleaner. A fresh scent, like everything, was new. Sometimes life gets heavy like the humidity and your soul is the one that needs the good rain. This was mine.

Friendship, Love, and Happiness

“It turns out that people who are more socially connected to family, to friends, to community, are happier, they’re physically healthier, and they live longer than people who are less well connected.”

Prof. Robert J Waldinger – Harvard University

Friendship, Love, and Happiness

is a celebration of what makes us most happy…

close, quality relationships.

Jazz Amour sends you on a journey

to reflect on the great moments and the difficult times

in finding and keeping relationships; and then puts you in charge of navigating your own goals, relationships

and ultimately your happiness.

This book is a must read,

and one that you’ll want to read again,

and again.

Forbidden Love Songs

How can love songs be “forbidden”?

They can be when the love is between two men in the late ’90s and one person is already in a relationship with someone else.

This collection of poems is about falling in love when you’re 3,000 miles apart. The poems were written over the course of a few months at the beginning of a passionate yet challenging love affair. Many of the poems were actually written in airports after a tearful good-bye and not knowing when I would see him again. Some of the poems were written after my partner's tragic loss of his parents in a homicide/suicide. 22 years later, we’re still together today and I love him now more than ever!

Falling Through the Cracks

Depression, illness, pain, and loss can become private homes of isolation. It’s tempting to convince ourselves these homes of suffering are proof we suffer alone. Humanity falls through the cracks each time we are failed by a medical system, ignored by policy, and abandoned by those supposed to protect—to love us. May the reader find some commonality within these pages. It can be difficult to find home—know you’re not alone. May the reader experience ataraxia.

de Luna: The Light in My Darkness

As the moon’s gravity controls the waves at sea, so does de Luna grasp the intensifying emotions of power plus constraint. Submerging deeply in the darkness of pain, de Luna seeks to convey the experience of transitioning from a place of uncertainty to a place of serenity. Only to rise to the empowerment of newfound identity.

Collections of a Filthy Heart

I have a filthy heart.

It’s been bruised,

and broken,

and houses secrets best left in the dark.

These are its collections.

Courtney Jones lives in downtown Toronto, working in content creation and digital strategy. An avid lover of the written word, she prefers to pass her free time reading a good book while enjoying a glass of even better red wine.

Beauty and the Dark

Quick and fast notes of poetry and personal quotes to live my own life by, now shared with the world. Welcome to my world and inner most dark, beautiful thoughts. In this book I wear my mental illness and addictions on my sleeve in a written form that is very relatable and easy to understand.

Awake in Dreams Sleeping Death Away

Awake in Dreams Sleeping Death Away is a pun on the different states of consciousness, which is open to multifactorial answers. In reality, the observations in the poems leave the readers perhaps with more questions than answers.
The three states of consciousness—awakening, sleeping, and dreaming—hint at the fine line between life and death. The entire book can be seen as a dream.

Awake in Dreams Sleeping Death Away does not try to scientifically claim any truths, but it does attempt to question what we may hold as true. It is more important to experience the poems, rather than to actualize them in an objective manner. No doubt the meaning or truth in these poems, if any can be found, will be organic and morph with each new reader.   

As a Woman Thinketh

Mike Pauro, aka ‘Ajax Moon’ and his daughter, Morgan Deeble, aka ‘Bridey Moon’ remake the aphorism examined by James Allen for women. In this transposition of Allen’s classic, the authors revisit the impact of thought on health, purpose, achievement, ideas, and serenity from the female perspective. The work is accompanied by imagery from early 20th century postcards passed down for generations in their family. The images were selected to be contemporaneous of the era of James Allen (1864-1912).

Art and Poetry by Pollock

Life was smooth sailing and quite normal up until my mom Janis was killed in a car accident heading from Santa Cruz California to Carmel when I was 11 years old. After her death, life changed drastically from a nice gentle breeze to a category five tornado; an inferno of drugs, lies and alibis. Let’s just say… No more smooth sailing. When the dust began to settle at the age of 24, I enlisted in the United States Navy and set sail for a better life and once again it was smooth sailing.

Here are some of my experiences, thoughts, and photographs of my artwork which I use as a way to process my childhood traumas.

Processing as I stack stones and transfer the negative energy into a beautiful piece of work giving it life; it lives then eventually dies, taking the negative energy with it.

I hope you feel something from these pages within.

An Owl's Tales

Life is a trail of crossing paths, some barely noticed, others with profound impacts. Did Santa bring that special football or the right Barbie doll? Did you pass that tough high school teacher’s course? Remember your first love? Was the pound puppy with sad but hopeful eyes ever chosen? Was the homeless beggar on the corner worth helping? The paths of Santa and teachers and loves and others who need help influence the course of our path, some for good, others not so much. But all of your paths make you, you.

Is it better to know or to feel what we should do? Maybe it doesn’t matter as long as the trail is guided by the heart. One man’s journey through a lifetime of crossed paths is portrayed in An Owl’s Tales. Some paths will sound familiar; some will challenge; some will motivate, while others will touch your heart. The wise old owl who sleeps with one eye open observes everything, reacts to little, but remembers. When your race is run, what will have been your important paths?