Visual Poetry

Life isn't always easy and when times are tough and we're feeling hopeless, we turn to music for comfort. Although each and every one of us has a different music preference, we can all relate to some form of music. We can use music to get us through tough times, to celebrate and to express ourselves. Lately I've realised that everything you have ever been through doesn't leave a scar, it leaves a song. Life isn't a battle that leaves us with wounds, life is an album that we fill with different songs throughout the course of our existence. Each song is from a different memory or experience. Those things you never got over?  The things that broke you?  The things more commonly referred to as your "scars"? Those are beautiful songs written by your soul; every note is a tear and every tear is a memory sneaking out. Our past does not define us nor do our feelings, therefore our songs do not define our album. They do, however, change us and make us who we ar

If all your prayers were answered, would it change the world or just yours? We're so absorbed in our own problems and things happening in our own lives that we don't realise there's a whole world outside of our situation. There's a whole world full of people, each of them going through their own hard times in life. Everyone is struggling with something and everyone is waiting on a miracle. Everyone could use a little help. I'm not saying you need to go around solving everyone's problems. If you are able to, help someone, but sometimes people's problems are too big for us to have direct control over. We then make the mistake of thinking we can't help them. When we - as Christians - have problems, we pray about them. We ask God to help us. We ask Him to help us get through it and we ask Him to work a miracle for us. We forget that we aren't the only people in need. Everyone could use a little extra help and many people are in need of a miracle

We take photographs to preserve memories. We take photographs of things we know aren't going to last so that we can have a way of remembering them. We take pictures of our friends, family and pets when we're enjoying a moment so that we have a way of looking back on it. We take pictures of places we've been to so that we can remember the place even after we've left it. We take pictures of beautiful things that aren't very common so that we may see them again and preserve the moment. One of the most bittersweet feelings we experience in life is thinking about how much we're going to miss a moment while we're still living it. Personally, I have a slight obsession with taking pictures of the sky. There's something about the colours of the sky and the clouds and the way they arrange themselves that speaks to me. It's an orderly, expressive kind of chaos that gives me a profound feeling of freedom. I take photographs of it when I feel it is particula

Drawing: "Hopeless Opus" - Nicole Nolte In this drawing, the tree barely has any leaves. It once was beautiful, lush and full. Unfortunately, not everything beautiful lasts forever. Seasons change and the beautiful things we were once so sure of wither away - slowly but surely - no matter how tight we hold on or how badly we need them. Eventually they leave us and - much like this tree - we are left bare; a mere frame or shell of who we once were. Light still shines on the tree - slowly giving it the energy it needs to stand as great and beautiful as it once was - but no light makes its way to the left side of the tree. The side of the tree the girl knows is dark, with very little hope of showing new life anytime soon other than the few lonely leaves serving only as a reminder of what once was there but now is lost. The branches are thin, almost fragile. Without its leaves, it is left bare and vulnerable. Although the branches are so thin, a swing still hangs from

The warlock did not want to love anyone because he thought it would make him weak. He thought he'd make himself vulnerable by falling in love or loving anyone, for that matter. He thought he was setting himself up for heartbreak. He wasn't as cold and cruel as the story portrays him as in the beginning, he was only afraid. He was afraid of love. As humans, love is our strongest and most powerful emotion and it can be pretty scary. It's really confusing and hard to understand. It's unexplainable and the thought of it is often rather daunting and somewhat ominous. The warlock isn't the only person to ever fear love. As humans, we become so afraid of vulnerability and heartache that we shield our hearts to the extent that nobody can get in. We deny how we feel and we push those feelings deep into the darkest depths of our soul where it's easiest for us to ignore them. Think of how much love has been wasted; people always trying to escape it and move on to stop

A long time ago, there lived a warlock in a far away magical kingdom. As he grew up, he observed how foolish his friends got whenever they fell in love and how they'd almost always end up getting themselves hurt in some or other way. He decided he never wanted to fall prey to such weakness or be controlled by his heart and he used the Dark Arts to ensure his immunity to love. His family - unaware of what he'd done and of his immunity to love - laughed at his cruel, uncaring and cold nature, telling him that all would change once he met the right woman for him and fell in love with her. Of course, this never happened. Though many maidens did try to touch his heart and get him to find an interest in them, none succeeded. Years went by and his parents soon passed away, but he remained completely unaffected by their death. If anything, he was thrilled to be the sole ruler of the Kingdom and to have the castle all to himself. He transferred his greatest treasure to the deepest d

Loss. We've all felt it. We've all experienced it. We've all lost something. We've all lost someone. We've all lost hope. Sometimes, we get to the point where we lose ourselves. When we've lost something, we don't try to forget it. No, it hurts us and tears us up inside - piece by piece - but as humans we refuse to let it go.  We try to find it all over again, to get it back, rather than forget it. We compare our current situation to the life we lived before we knew loss. Thinking that this constant comparison will help us hold on to that happiness without realizing the simple fact that comparison is the thief of joy. We hold on to those memories the way we wish we held on to the person, thing or feeling we lost. We spend hours rethinking our actions and  decisions, hating ourselves and wishing we'd done things differently because maybe then we'd still be happy. We blame ourselves for the loss.  We punish ourselves. We drown ourselves in t

Drawing: "Empty Vessel" - Nicole Nolte Perhaps we feel empty because we leave pieces of ourselves in everything we used to love and we just accept that it's gone. We forget who we are. We lock our hearts away, acting as if it's us against the world but really it's just us against ourselves.  We give up too easily, we're afraid to fight for what we want and what we believe is right because we live in a society where not everyone's opinion is of equal worth to the person next to them.  If something makes you happy, fight for it. Don't just give up. Stop keeping quiet in fear of offending people or getting yourself into uncomfortable situations because you will regret it. Speak up!  Rather an "oops" than a "what if". We cry when we lose the people we love but we don't realize how quickly we are losing ourselves. We don't realize what we had until it's gone. We don't know real love or happiness until we make a mis

Drawing: "Permanent Residence" - Nicole Nolte What is love and how can we explain it? Hearts (❤) are merely romanticised symbols representing the idea of love as they have basically nothing to do with this powerful feeling and are fairly abstract symbols. This beautiful feeling (love) is rather indescribable if you think about it. Everybody will experience, express and explain it in a different way.  When we've been hurt and we feel as if we can never love again, we say our heart has been broken and although our feelings aren't directly associated with our hearts, if you've been hurt badly enough you can actually feel that emotional pain in a physical sense. When you're crying your eyes out at night - feeling completely and hopelessly alone - your chest feels tight, as if your heart is going into lockdown to protect itself. You begin to feel your pain, rather than only experiencing it. It's this particular kind of pain that leads me to  believe ou