Friday, September 30, 2016

Proof of a Life Well-loved





Lord, when my life with its joy and its strife
Is chiselled down to bare size
All that I ask for the fruit of its task
Is a crop of hard good-byes

© Janet Martin

My mother-to-mother heart is full of hugs and prayers for my sis who was dreading this morning's good-byes to a daughter who is on her way to Thailand for 6 mos.

Where Nothing New Exists...







In unexpected places nature graces us with awe
Each day is like a window-seat where what we thought we saw
Is unlike anything we’ve seen; as bud and berm untwists
And we are taken by surprise where nothing new exists

Look up; look down, then all around, there is no second place
In nature’s gallery each entry is a masterpiece
Where halls of hill and field exhibit Wonder free of charge
And we are to be pitied most if we miss God at large

This is the stomping ground where Ancient Covenant abides
As long as earth remains heaven unchains its season-tides
And we, like pioneers discover for ourselves, amour
Because no one has worn the skin that we are in before

Hello, ye yellow Sun-flower, farewell, spring-summer-fall
Look down; look up, time’s testament is like a madrigal
Its penmanship of trembling lip and Hunger’s tug-of-heart
Draws from an age-old inkwell, Original works of art

© Janet Martin


 That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
And there is nothing new under the sun.

Eccles.1:9

Wednesday, September 28, 2016

Recognizing Right Now For What It Is...



 Once upon a time there was a little boy who declared that 'tree apples are way more 'liscious than store apples'...

 Sitting beneath fruit-studded limbs seemed to give him an idea...

How do I reach them, he asks...
uh-oh, how do I pick them? he wonders, hanging on for dear life...


...and they all munched happily ever after;-)


Sometimes those moments of no-second-thought
Return in moments of rather-have-not
Then we remember the splendor of days
We don’t remember for their common ways

Sometimes, when life is a kick in the lip
We look with new eyes at what we let slip
Then, often we are quite dumbly surprised
At how life’s best days are humbly disguised

Sometimes our wish and want puts us to shame
For while we wish we miss what Past will claim
Sometimes the treasure of ‘best memories’
Is as simple as pleasure of child, apples and trees

Sometimes (how about right now) we should look
At what we see like an almost-mem’ry-book
Then I am sure we would gentle our stare
And handle 'right-now' with tenderest care

© Janet Martin



Who Doesn't Love Fall?!

Who doesn't love fall colors? asks Linda, here.
It suddenly primed my heartstrings with what waits in October, so I'm just passing it on;-)
 We still have three days of September 2016 left to make memorable its existence.
Let's do it with purpose!

Who can resist the undoing of earth?
Nature unravels its offspring of birth
Gardens grow weary yet heave-ho becomes
A rainbow-halo; squash, pumpkins and mums

Who is immune to the blue-bluster breeze?
Teasing and tugging red whispers from trees
Sun-dappled apple-sweet orchards are bliss
We are all lovers when love is like this

Who can say no to fall’s sumptuous fare?
Full-color frontiers and frost-flavored air
Harvest-hulled hillsides, paint palettes so vast
That no earth-artist is fit for the task

Who can disdain what no hand can prevent?
After the laughter of summer is spent
After the flower is stripped of its bell
Color climaxes in woodland and dell

Who in this season of farewell will sing?
Death shrouds the globe in robes fit for a king
Landscapes surrender while splendor runs rife
Dusk deepens early, the wind is a scythe


© Janet Martin

Tuesday, September 27, 2016

Grappling With Grandeur



Belief extols God’s excellence
Heaven and earth attest
As visage feasts on evidence
And wonders at the rest

The fount from whence today is drawn
Will not forever seep
Nor from its seeming fathoms spawn
New dawn to light the deep

This is the day the Lord has made
Its taper fills the skies
It wills response as accolade
And homage to its prize

For we have nothing more or less
God grants to all the same
This day of grace, His promises
For everyone to claim

When time’s moot moment-thirst is quenched
And fists unclench, what then?
This day is God's gift, mercy drenched
Before That Sure Amen

The worry of this groaning heath
Cannot, will not prevail
God is the sole soul-barer, Death,
Yon solemn heights will scale

The port from whence today is lent
Will someday seal its bars
As Last Breath lifts us past this tent
And its small splash of stars

Last Breath, Doom or Deliverer
With yea or nay we choose
When God both Taker and Giver
Lets Death collect His dues
 

© Janet Martin

 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:23

John 4:36
Already the reaper draws his wages and gathers a crop for eternal life, 
so that the sower and the reaper may rejoice together.



Monday, September 26, 2016

To We of Unpopular Creed...





To we who place our faith in more
Than logic born of what we see
To we who cling to Word of yore
And not modern philosophy
The promise of Inheritance
(Though it seems many are deceived
Only because of ignorance)
To we of unpopular creed
And targets of prophesied hate
Lord, it is for lost souls we plead
Before it is too late, too late

© Janet Martin

 If the world hates you, understand that it hated Me first. 
If you were of the world, it would love you as its own. 
Instead, the world hates you, because you are not of the world, 
but I have chosen you out of the world.
Remember the word that I spoke to you: 
‘No servant is greater than his master.’ 
If they persecuted Me, they will persecute you as well; 
if they kept My word, they will keep yours as well.  
But they will treat you like this on account of My name, 
because they do not know the One who sent Me. 
If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin. 
Now, however, they have no excuse for their sin.