Showing posts with label sister. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sister. Show all posts

Tuesday, November 13, 2018

The Picture of November's Twilight


 Because nothing slips out of the reach of a poem...
This one is for my sister. 
She called before supper and wondered if the evening captured my attention too
and did I write a poem?
 Dear, sweet sister, often calls if only to ask 'What did you write today?'

I answered her kindred-spirit question tonight with "yes, I stood there soaking it in for a minute and even dared to wish for a moment of Quiet To Write, but then was immediately convicted with 'careful what you wish for' and that no, there is no poem, 
but there is extra guests for supper and Grandson etc. 
and we chatted a bit about why the colorless colours were so captivating tonight
then each returned to our own supper-chores etc.
The sky has been shedding its softness ever since she called...
(this photo was taken the other 'less-lively' evening😉)

The moment passed.
The air, like smoky flannel fell, 
then blue
Then black
And snuffed the images 
of dying day from view
But could not steal 
from wonder’s reel
God’s tender work of art
The picture of 
November’s twilight
Wrapped around the heart

…and so is life.
Its moments rife with heaven’s 
emptied jars
And such
Where touch is quick to cool
 but not its aftermath of stars
That brush the air 
and places where
Only Thought’s Owner sees
The frame filled with 
soft shimmers
Of love’s precious memories

© Janet Martin

Tuesday, March 27, 2018

Estimable Entreaty...or, Of Growing Old


A simple sonnet for my sister Lucy's Birthday today...
Happy Birthday Lucy!
Wishing you God's gift of joy in the year (Lord willing years) ahead!

The nearest, dearest gift of growing old
Time weaves with threads we sometimes overlook
Life’s sacred spoil of love and toil unfold
Fond pages in a phantom picture book

A panoramic spread of scenes forsook
Bids us revere a year’s moment-ous lease
Where fingers through which sands of time are shook
Siphons from stars and scars, a masterpiece

…as daily death grants the subtle increase
Of seasons splayed before our shut-eye gaze
Its startling art of kind simplicities
Soft-weaves with common sheaves Life’s Best of Days

Where it seems that we learn and then relearn
The value of time’s treasured No-return

© Janet Martin



Last night while chopping colorful veggies for supper I was struck again
how life's simplest gifts are its sweetest marvels! 
The older we get the more we realize the Prize of The Moment!

Sisters are one of love's/life's greatest gifts!
I know I shared the photo below here, (on another sister get-together)
but its a precious shot on a simple summer's day long ago...of sisters
From left to right...
Marlene, Carolyn, Cheryl, Lucy, Janet



Slow erosion
Where an ocean
Of emotion
Sweeps a shore
Where a moment
Seals a moment
To moments
That are no more

Tender splendor
Steals the vendor
To a younger
You and me
Where sleek surges
Swell in dirges
For splurges
Washed out to sea

© Janet Martin




Tuesday, August 1, 2017

Better The House of Mourning



 Yesterday we attended the funeral of another one of my mother-in-law's sisters. 
She was in her 88th year, spending most of them in quiet, humble service to her family and fellowman.
This verse was read in her funeral message of comfort and caution...

It is better to go to the house of mourning, than to go to the house of feasting: 
for that(death) is the end of all men; 
and the living will lay it to his heart.
Eccles.7:2



Better the house of mourning
Its meeting to attend
Than to ignore the warning
‘Soon life’s short stint will end’

Better the house of mourning
Where solemn heed is paid
To an orbit adorning
Life's dust-to-dust parade

Better the house of mourning
Than wine and feast's embrace
Lest we fall prey to scorning
The gravity of grace

Better the house of mourning
For there meek thought is bowed
Beneath Love’s tender awning
Resisted by the proud

Better the house of mourning
As mankind lays to heart
The crux of this sojourning
Where flesh and soul will part

© Janet Martin



While chatting with my oldest sister at the luncheon after the service, I mentioned that when I get home I need to tend to 2 Bu. of beans waiting to be preserved.


Guess who showed up at my house as soon as she could?!! Yep, Cheryl, my oldest sister.
Sometimes secretly I think her name might be Tabitha and this verse(Acts 9:36
in modern day could read something like this;
In Wallenstein there is a disciple named Tabitha (in Greek her name is Cheryl); 
she is always doing good and helping the poor.

SO glad Sat. night's picking is preserved...
  ...before we begin today's batch.


Friday, October 31, 2014

So Alike, Yet oh So Different



Approx. 40 years later...


As we sit here recalling years that long have come and gone
And as we reminisce of childhood’s happy hours spent
Where kindred memories abound, some shared, some saved by one
I smile; because we’re so alike yet oh, so different

One remembers something that sparks someone else’s thought
And suddenly we are transported back; laughter is bent
Around the kitchen sink perhaps where life was learned and taught
While we grew up so much alike yet oh, so different

For a brief morning we relinquish bonds of mother-toll
As we become the little girls around our mother’s knee
And mother smiles as if she too returns to years time stole
Of having everyone at home the way it used to be

For things we cannot change, for afternoons lost and replaced
We tend time’s tender echoes with a reverent lament
As we exchange fond pictures framed where footsteps are retraced
In memories so much alike yet oh, so different

© Janet Martin

We were together on the old home farm yesterday to celebrate my mom’s birthday with our annual tea-party.Everyone brings food to enjoy with fellowship:)



It’s sweet and strange, the things the mind retains and so interesting to hear what one sister remembers that others have long forgotten! 

At this sink many an hour was spent chattering, arguing, being extremely silly, singing four-part harmony, watching the world from this window while doing dishes. A family with 10 kids always makes lots of laundry, lots of dishes and lots of precious memories.
My brother and his family live here on the home farm.