Sunday, November 3, 2013

But For a Bit of Ink and Thought


 Whenever I have a few minutes to kill I enjoy a few poems from my poetry cupboard...



But for a bit of thought and ink
Spilled earnestly upon a page
Names like Longfellow, Tennyson
Would lie in some forgotten age
And we would not be awed and thrilled
If thought in ink was never spilled

But for a bit of ink and thought
Falling madly or glad or sad
Then Shakespeare, Frost, Milton and Keats
And Coleridge would all be dead
Wilde, Riley, Whitman, Kipling, Clare
Would decay in a grave somewhere

But for a bit of thought and ink
We would not recognize this cast
The Brownings, Blakes and Dickinsons
All would be buried in the past
But for a bit of time and ink
Long now we taste their thought and drink

© Janet Martin


The Momentum of a Moment





The momentum of a moment is a silent, subtle surge
It inspires tender love songs and our deepest, dearest dirge
And It tugs from seed the wonder of a hand we cannot see
Then enfolds again its splendor to earth’s season-deity

An intangible tsunami is this tiny tick and tock
As It pulses in a countdown from an impalpable clock
It’s as searing as those sorrows that our mouths can never tell
And It fills unfathomed eons in that gulf twixt heav’n and hell

The momentum of a moment is a gossamer eclipse
Of the present, past and future pausing briefly on our lips
As the silk of half-breath grandeur slips into the by and by
Soon we follow its meander to that place beyond the sky

The momentum of a moment melds the bitter with the sweet
A kaleidoscope of learning as life’s light and shadow meet
And it blends within its bearing both defeat and victories
Shaping in its brief way-faring the expanse of centuries

© Janet Martin





Saturday, November 2, 2013

Love



 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+John+4%3A10&version=NIV  
This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 1 John 4:10
Image Source; pinterest

The whole world cries for it
The soldier dies for it
The young maid sighs for it
Love

The mourner mourns for it
The drifter burns for it
The scorner spurns,
Yet yearns for it
Love

The preacher prays for it
The lonely man pays for it
The gambler plays for it
Love

The miser saves for it
The beggar craves for it
The rich man slaves for it
Love

The devil lied for it
The sinner cried for it
The Savior died for it
Love

© Janet Martin

Of Masterpieces and Mortality




 For more Masterpieces see here 
or song below.

Oh, Artist of each season
Thy canvas sky and sod
Only a fool can see and yet
Deny that You are God

No man can match Your beauty
Each frame a Master-piece
Spring, summer, fall and winter
Portray Your awesomeness

Oh, Painter without parchment
We bow beneath Your brush
The God of earth and Heaven
Will never forsake us

© Janet Martin

 The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; Ps. 14:1  

  

Wishing you a wonderful, worshipful week-end!

Of Absolutes




 The golden-rod is silver...


Time will take its course
The leaf must fall away
And by a moment’s force
The gold will turn to gray

Both seed and deed will bear
Its fruit; the law of such
Ascribes to Deity somewhere
That our hands cannot touch

When that last trump is blown

Love will conquer all
We are not doomed to strife
For all will hear His call

© Janet Martin

The News as We Hear It...

  

Image Source

Writer's Unite PAD challenge Day 2: For today’s prompt, write a “news of the day” poem.

After editting
and rhetoric
and politics,
After omissions
and Conditions
and many
ignored submissions
we have
Today's News

Janet Martin

November Appears



November came whooshing in, in torrential down-pours and 90k/hr winds!

Writer's Digest PAD; Day 1, For today’s prompt, write an appearing poem.

After the harvest is gathered
After the tree sheds its tear
After its leaf-song is scattered
Over a landscape dull; drear
November appears

After sweet dog-days are squandered
In lemonade afternoons
And after the poet has wandered
Over its sun-shadow tunes…

After the twilight is hastened
Early toward stilly-deep
After the kissing of children
And stories and prayers ere they sleep

After the Margarets and Johnnys
All have out-grown last year’s shoes
And after the bee has its honey
And asters have crooned farewell blues

…after the spilling of roses
Follows the path of its peers
While ‘neath our feet a door closes
Over a graveyard of years
November appears

© Janet Martin  



Friday, November 1, 2013

Before and After





My thought-life was divided in two for such a long time; ‘before the wedding’ and ‘after the wedding’. Thus, I find myself looking for new before’s and touching softly the long ‘ever-afters’

…and now I wonder; what hidden ‘before’
Lurks in the hours that fall
The ‘after you’ of many a love
Has no ending point at all
But the ‘before’ is a breath-by-breath race
To unknowns that we cannot tell
I have known pinnacles in love’s embrace
And loneliness akin to hell
Thus expectation divides my intent
‘befores’ are an intricate thing
It is the path leading to the advent
Of what ‘ever-after’ will bring
Synchronized free-fall of heart-ache and laughter
Caught in the middle of ‘Before’ and ‘After’

© Janet Martin

I chuckled the other day as I watched my daughter’s impatience; her eagerness to get everything in place, her dreams of ‘their place’ and I wanted to say, oh, my precious, you’re gonna miss this!’
so, I take a slow walk around the house and whisper, 'mom, you're gonna miss this'