Welcome to the May edition of "Brilliant!"  We hope you and your family are well and happy and that April was an excellent month for you all.

Families come in all blends and configurations, and for many of us, the definition of family also includes the pets that share their lives with us.  Barbara and I have been blessed with the friendship and unconditional love of many gentle, intelligent animals over the years.  At present, we live with two dogs and we all protect and love each other completely.

We also have the good fortune of living on a beautiful acreage property with an amazing variety of native wildlife that share our land and treat us as well-liked neighbours.  Recently our Tawny Frog-Mouthed Owls made a reappearance, roosting for several days at a time in a gum tree just metres from our back deck (in fact I can see them from my office window as I write this newsletter).  Our Wallaby family (Dad, Mum and baby) can regularly be seen relaxing for hours at a time under the trees in the warm sun, and the other day I found a Koala Bear slowly climbing up one of our gum trees.  He stopped and we exchanged fascinated looks at each other, before he continued heading up to enjoy a meal of eucalyptus leaves.  It is a real thrill and honour to experience all these animals feeling so comfortable with our presence at such close quarters.

Barbara has always insisted that animals can communicate very easily with us, when we bother to listen, and she’s helped me to understand how true that is.  She’s been psychic all her life so Barbara can pick up on a lot that not everyone else can, including myself.  She’s also constantly reading and soaking up information and experiences so she can blend them into her writing.  I’m always fascinated to hear and learn about all the seminars and courses she attends as Barbara becomes ever increasingly knowledgeable about the spiritual energy that connects us all.

Those of you who have read Barbara's visionary novel, "Letters to Michael", will know that spiritual energy continues to connect us even after we cross over.  “Letters to Michael” is the first book in the series that Barbara is writing about life after death and spiritual guides.  Her insight is just amazing and we keep hearing back from people saying how much it has helped them through times of crisis.  Everything Barbara creates is full of love, incredibly uplifting and downright entertaining.  She really is a Bright Light.

Talking about bright lights, the Bright Light Café has a great variety of entertainment for you this month with 5 wonderful new poems, an interesting anecdote, a fabulous new art piece, 3 great audio performances from a new voice at the Café, and a brand new member of our special Featured Talent family.

And now it gives me great pleasure to hand you over to psychic, author, actress, composer, producer, webmaster, Creative Director of Bright Light Multimedia and my wife, Barbara Llewellyn, to tell you about these great new items and the talented people who created them.

Congratulations!!!!

Please join us in welcoming Ravi Bedi to The Bright Light Café Featured Talent hall of fame.  Ravi now has pages dedicated to him alone, presenting his interview, personal photographs and biography, as well as links to his art and writing.  

Achieving this Featured Talent status is a real sign of talent and dedication to the creative arts, requiring at least eight items (art, music, performance and/or writing) to be showcased throughout the Café.   Ravi is our first painter to grace these prestigious pages and we are pleased and honoured to present his work to you.  He has also written an interesting travelogue of a road trip in India that we're sure you will enjoy.  All of Ravi's creations are tinged with much warmth and colour which are obviously a reflection of this honourable and talented man.  You will find that Ravi's interview and biography are filled with same warmth and colour. 

Congratulations, Ravi, it's a true pleasure to welcome you into this elite section of creative talent.

Multimedia

Ravi Bedi, from India, presents a rich perspective on the beauty of youth in meltingly earthy tones.  "The Two Women" is an oil painting on canvas surrounded by matching stories, poems, music and meditations.  Enjoy! 

The Two Women

Beautiful young women and men surround us and deserve our attention and admiration, for physical youth is so fleeting.  All ages deserve our praise but the less years we carry, the more fragile and precious we are.  We may wander through life only half seeing so much glory, not taking the time to absorb all the beauty and unspoken messages, but youth is not wasted on the young, as Oscar Wilde once proclaimed, youth lives on in our ability to see and express its essence. 
See now ...

Anecdotes

It is sometimes very easy to tell when a person is truly talented. Not only is their work outstanding, their persona is also shining with gentle goodness and humility.  Norma Jean Kawak, from Australia, had the good fortune to experience this fact when she worked with an actor before his glory days began.

Chop Suey Sweetness 

It was a Saturday afternoon in the 1960’s and the Merchant of Venice was playing in the Brisbane City Town Hall to a packed audience of high school students and their teachers. The actors were all from the Petrie Terrace amateur theatrical group. I had brought my nine year old sister along to watch the play whilst I was working in the wings controlling the stage lights. 
Read More ...

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Poetry

Bright Light Café Featured Talent, Carl Palmer, from the United States, has written a poem that is almost guaranteed to make you cry - in a good way.  One of those sort of crying sessions that leave you feeling lighter and more peaceful.  It certainly brought those sorts of tears to our eyes and hearts.  And wait until you hear the wonderful performance of this piece by the very talented Sky from Australia.  Do yourself a favour and go see and hear this heart-warming poem as soon as you can.

Her Fella

she rubs my head
runs her fingers across my face
and she cries
she holds me tight
her head next to mine
and she cries
I tell her that nothing has changed
I try to explain
Read more ...

Michael Lee Johnson, also from the United States, has a vivid partnership with words - able to convey in concise and often sparse language a vibrant lingering picture and emotion.  His "Flight of the Eagle" took us into the skies and his next two poems place us firmly in the very human.  

She

Somewhere
she has lost
her shadow.
Read More ...

Michelangelo: Painter & Poet

Michelangelo
with steel balls
& a wire brush
wishing he was
wearing motorcycle leathers,
going wild & crazy,
stares cross eyed at the
Sistine Chapel ceiling-
Read More ...

Geoff Weilert, is yet another very fine talent from the United States.  Geoff has the wonderful skill of turning the mundane into delightful flights of fancy and fun.  His latest poems focus on how much easier life might be if only we could lose all responsibility and just be no-one and he manages to make it sound rather appealing.  Geoff then topples to the ground upwards and turns a scientific fact into a giggling impossibility.  If you feel like a smile, Geoff's poems are definitely the place to visit.

Nobody Wrote This  

When I was young, I was told to work hard,
And to make someone of my self,
Be the best, become a champ
And put trophies on my shelf.
So strive I did, through toil and tears,
To have my star shine above the rest.
But now I find, ‘twas all in vain,
Because, to be somebody, is not the best.
Read More ...

YTIVARG

I know it’s sure as shootin’
That since the days of Isaac Newton
When London Bridge is falling, it’s falling down.
But I say right to your face
That I have found a place
That would bring to old Sir Isaac one big frown.
Read more ...

Performances

Sky, from Australia, who already graces the Bright Light Café with his music and an interesting music review, now brings his deep, rich voice, his gentle empathy and his fine acting talent to the Café's stories and poems.  The written word takes on so much more life and presence when performed by talented people and Sky is certainly one very talented being.  Enjoy!

Her Fella by Carl Palmer

she rubs my head
runs her fingers across my face
and she cries
she holds me tight
her head next to mine
and she cries
I tell her that nothing has changed
I try to explain
Listen Now
Performed by Sky

Not This October  by Stephen Pray 

Last October was mean, 
spits of snow and ice 
came out of nowhere to bite like 
swarms of mosquitoes in the spring.
Listen Now
Performed by Sky

The Opportunist  by Carl Palmer

Jason Amalynn was the leader in his field of TV and movie special effects. His invention was a special Prism laser projector using image reflection and light refraction to create a 3D hologram. The mirage could be created and shown most anywhere on most anything, not just as trick photography on film, but projected upon buildings, clouds and even a waterfall once. I was in total awe of Jason as his understudy, however felt completely betrayed when he vowed to take his technique public. That’s why I killed him.
Listen Now
Performed by Sky

Surrounding Ravi Bedi's latest painting, Two Women, are some very romantic and love-filled audio accompaniments.  We hope you enjoy them all.

Sweet Sound of Laughter In Your Smile Poem by Denise Marshall

Indian Bride  Poem by Shanu Goyal

A Woman's Beauty  Poem by Shanu Goyal

Whenever You Smile (Song) from the CD "True Love" 

Pretty Thing (Music)  Written & performed by Sky

Filling the World with Love (Meditation) by B.A.Llewellyn

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We wish you a marvellous month of May and hope every day is jam-packed with good times and good news.  

With our warmest regards,


Barbara Llewellyn & Rod Kirkham 
Publishers

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