Monday, September 29, 2014

Summer's Afterglow





How readily a season shapes
The pastures of the dead
Our eyes devour landscapes now
Like beggars seizing bread

September green is fair as June
Save for the ling’ring gaze
Where farewell tunes the Brigadoon
That set our hearts ablaze

And to a crypt soft-petal-lipped
Where summer slipped and fell
The pumpkin-flavored flowers drip
To fence-row, heath and dell

The stream that snakes through cattail brakes
To yonder ponds and seas
Gleams like a seamless sash on lakes
Of bronze frond melodies

Time’s building-blocks are lithe, like flocks
Of feather-citadels
Its touchdown locks and forms the rocks
Where soon the future dwells

A diadem of garnet gem
Graces September’s brow
Where now our sighs ravish the hem
Of summer’s afterglow



 © Janet Martin

Sunday, September 28, 2014

Once More...


Once more Thy gracious goodness
Startles the drowsing lea
Thy everlasting witness
Doth comfort what must be  

To crypts of soulful hunger
Once more Thy mercy sends
A measure of new moments
That naught but Love defends

...and we of lesser knowing
Lift up hearts full of praise
Once more to Thee, bestowing
Thy patience to our ways

Ah, Shepherd of kind Essence
Hear this from humble dust
Awake in us Thy Presence
Once more, so we may trust

Janet Martin~


I would like to reply to you
    and to your friends with you.
Look up at the heavens and see;
    gaze at the clouds so high above you.
If you sin, how does that affect him?
    If your sins are many, what does that do to him?
If you are righteous, what do you give to him,
    or what does he receive from your hand?
Your wickedness only affects humans like yourself,
    and your righteousness only other people. 

Job 35:4-8

Saturday, September 27, 2014

Because We Do or Not



 (but here and there 'tis nice to pause with book, un-chained from Duty's laws, where living bids us do, do, do, to rest beneath God's blue, blue, blue...)

…because we choose to do or not
The one who watches will be taught
For hand, compelling as a sword
Is often mightier than word

Because we do; lines not of speech
Convinces readers as we teach
Not by the flower-seeds of voice
But by the power-deeds of choice

…because we do in every day
And say what tongue will never say
Each script is written by the quill
Of hand and foot; soul- stories spill

…to pages laid upon Time’s stair
Where our do’s and don’ts declare
The truth of whom we serve and love
Pray tell, what will our writing prove?

© Janet Martin


 Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom. Eccles.9:10


 With God's help we will do mighty things, for he will trample down our foes Ps. 60:12


Friday, September 26, 2014

Ever Feel Like This?...Blessed



If we are blessed we will be
A step-stool,
A leaning-post,
A sounding-board,
A dinner host, 
A handkerchief,
A teddy-bear,
A hope-filled chest
An easy-chair
A launching pad
A broom, a ball
 For to be needed
is a blessing above all

© Janet Martin

The Picnic Will Not Care...





If we did not, did not lie there
To sip the blue breeze-seasoned air
Nor popped its cork at noisy noon
Or paused at work to taste its swoon
The picnic will not care

If we did not sprawl half-reclined
Beneath tracery leaf-song lined
To contemplate nothing all
Save crumbs of cake and nibs of fall
The picnic will not mind

If we did not count soft sky-sheep
Or spread a quilt against a sweep
Of clover-leaf or green-grass sea
To revel in God’s poetry
The picnic will not weep

If we did not, did not lie there
Without intention but to share
A dream or two with he or she
Beneath the reaching reading-tree
The picnic will not care

© Janet Martin

Yesterday, after reading Brenda's post
and after a day of

laundry...

 
Pruning,


chopping trees (or at least trying;)


Doing a bit of fall decorating


I lamented the fact that, though I love picnics it had been a while since the last one...
So I laid out a blanket, a basket, some books...


...and just as I was about to enjoy!! a lady dropped by wondering if she could trade a few of her perennials for a few of mine, so we did, then Emily dropped in, then I needed to take Matt to work,
then 'my li'l guys'I babysit came and we played...




...and had supper, then the boys left and Victoria and I went to 'meet the teacher' at school, then we came home, quickly cleaned up supper, went to Matt's hockey game...
...and the picnic didn't care.
it was still there when I returned to put it away for another day...
today?
Who knows?




Another Go-round





 (Three separates poem-lets or one full poem...you choose:)

That Big Alarm Clock in the air rouses the morning light
The Hour is at hand with unrelenting appetite
For seasons have no snooze buttons and even as men sleep
The harbinger of winter-summer taps his restless feet

***

This thread man treads is like a tightrope hinged beyond the skies  
Time lays its dead beneath the spreading realms of yester-sighs
Prayer grasps at skeins of Hope and pleads for courage to proceed
For day is heavy with the dew of fear and want and need

***

Each tick-tock breaks a lock; and Future spills into the Now
Soon thought salutes the troops that fall into its afterglow
While that Alarm Clock in the air pulses with fresh appeal
And wakes the takers for another go-round on Time’s Wheel

© Janet Martin