Showing posts with label youth. Show all posts
Showing posts with label youth. Show all posts

Sunday, May 2, 2021

Of Season-Spectrum


Let no one despise you for your youth,
but set the believers an example 
in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.

Happy 23rd Birthday, Matt!

We love the laughter your sense of humour brings to our home
 as well as your conscientious attitude to life!
Wishing you God's guidance and blessing in the year ahead!


Photo Credit; Brittany Ruppert


The spectrum of a season swiftly sweeps from now to then
The boys and girls of Good Old Days become women and men
The dreamlands of sweet childhood clash with brash reality
As fruit begins to emerge on green branches of the tree

Accountability begins to replace innocence
What was footloose and fancy-free now demands diligence
And where the air once wore the cheers of ‘no more school, hooray’
The student starts to learn that lessons take no holiday

...where shoes too large for little feet to fit, suddenly do
As boys and girls of Good Old Days shoulder life’s ‘Nothing New’
‘Remember your Creator then, in the days of your youth
So that you may be able to discern well what is truth’

Because the spectrum of a seasons soon loses its sheen
Branches become set in their ways, that once were limber-green
And harvest that seemed far off starts to render its return
Where a new age of Innocence waits eagerly, to learn


© Janet Martin


Tuesday, December 15, 2020

Echo-graphs...

For young people everywhere
Don't Give Up!



No child can outgrow their mother's prayers...
I really pray for our young people right now
with everything shut down
school online etc. 
Many are bored, restless and lonely!
Today, as I watched one of my childcare tots 
totter across the yard all bundled up
it reminded me of a (sort of) long ago world 
that seemed so permanent at the time;
when our own children were little.
Now they are young men and women,
and all this isolation is very hard,
esp. for young men who tend to perhaps not have
as many indoor hobbies as girls might.
(esp. if they play sports)
Please pray for our young people, 
that they use this as an opportunity to grow in their faith
and to become upstanding examples of man and womanhood.
Moms and dads, I guess we need to set good examples first, right?

This poem formed in my head as I watched the tot with one eye
and the little girl trying to touch the sky with her toes
from the swing I was pushing, with the other!


Photo Echographs...

They scatter on December's yard 
Like tatters of an old postcard 
And decoupage a mother’s heart 
In a collage of mem’ry-art 

They waft like echoes on the air 
A soft impression of Somewhere 
Entangled in a mother’s sigh 
Those whisper-grins of days gone by 

They sparkle in fresh fallen snow 
Footfalls muffled by come and go 
To mirror in a mother’s tear 
Reflections of sweet yester-year 

They tug and hug and ebb and surge 
Where past, present and future merge 
To urge within a mother’s prayer 
A tender plea for daily care 

© Janet Martin

Friday, May 29, 2020

The Young and The Old


 Last month I wrote this poem 
Of Chapters Closed as I contemplated the impact of
The Changing of the Guard next door
(aka new owners of the farm next door)...as young farmers kicked up
the dust of planting crops and dreams.


It officially changes hands on June 1st

...now, just to clarify for my own peace of mind;
the farmer that is retiring is by NO means old!!
(he is the in the age-bracket of hubby and I😀)
He is just ready to hand over the reins to younger drivers...
(H-m-m! I wonder which one is the bride-to-be...scouting out their dream-home💓)

The young have the ambition that within the old has waned
The old have gathered wisdom that the young have not yet gained
The young have dreams enough to withstand work, grueling and hard
The old have borne Time’s sleight of hand and changing of the guard

The young are young enough to feel that Time is on their side
The old have been old long enough to know how swift its stride
Then thank God for the young where fire burns within their veins
And thank God for the old, willing to hand over the reins

The old train and equip the young, knowing what Time will do
…how soon the younger will become the older, yes, it’s true
For what once seemed remote and something other people bear
Has run its course across their skin, its fingers through their hair

The young have what it takes to make the old loosen their grip
The old have what it takes to make the young tighten the ship
The young have hopes not hampered by energy's empty jars
The old have sense enough not to throw water at the stars

© Janet Martin


So...
This week-end is bittersweet; though we look forward to meeting our new neighbours,
we sure will miss the old!
 our life-long farmer-neighbours are moving/retiring!
 Couldn't have asked for better neighbours,
always so kind, generous and helpful
and we certainly wish them the best yet to come!



Sunday, March 17, 2019

For All Those Things That Never Change...from a mom

'Because' I replied, dissatisfied with the vague answer when asked how Youth spent an evening/well into the night "because 'just hanging out' can cover a multitude of possibilities!"
(I well recall that answer:)
"Oh, so you don't trust us?" was the instant challenge to which 'old mother' replied,
"all my trust in the world won't keep you/th from temptation
and if you are a healthy red-blooded youth, you will be tempted
because THAT is one thing that does not change in spite of everything that does
which is why mothers pray for their sons/daughters...

They have no idea (yet) how many prayers follow, cover and carry...



Compensation comes in measures Youth cannot yet realize
Some things never change in spite of what plain sight just might surmise
Mother has a reason for the seasoned views that she maintains
…she was young like you once too with hunger coursing through her veins

We who seem quite antiquated to the up and coming clan
Wear suspicious second looks because of ways common to man
Where no matter how the tides may turn or what they might estrange
As the years goes by they too will learn how some things never change

She will always worry/pray not just because that’s what moms do
But because she knows the way a foot can twist inside a shoe
And for all the words invented to assuage and dismiss doubt
It is possible to tuck worlds between words that are left out

There will always be temptation (but never without escape)
Best intentions are worth nothing without deeds that give them shape
Idle hands are easy subjects for the devil to employ
Secret guilt is like a lesion that robs life of peace and joy

When your brow, still smooth a satin wears a crown with hints of snow
And the dust that young heels kicked up feels like just a wink ago
In some yonder sudden moment in time’s tender youth forsook
You will understand the reason for your mother’s searching look
 


© Janet Martin

Moms have been praying for ages!
 Are you a praying mother?
The world needs them now more than ever!









Friday, May 25, 2018

Moment-ous Impetus


Here's to The Moment; the measure of years!
Forgive, oh Lord, when by the transport of an idle thought
I do not cherish what I hold but mourn for what is not
The Past is cast in vaults without a keyhole or a key
Hope’s ‘phoenix from the ashes’ a present-activity

The banner of ‘new mercy’ billows from the eastern scrim
No fetter can bar heaven from masterpieces of Him
Where faithful to His promises the Lord does not forget
But fills our present with moments that are not memories…yet

© Janet Martin

Sometimes for a flicker I find myself 'wishing
when I admire the vigor of youth 
Time is much quicker than man can imagine; 
unveiling in its regale, timeless truth
And we admit as we dissect the 'wish' for what once was, 
how we would not go back in time
because with vim youthful, youth has to muster 
will for the big hill that they must still climb




The other day the whole Wishing Well delight began with 
a sweet sigh from Little Girl 'wishing it would be Christmas again'. 
Oh, are you sure you wish it was Christmas? I asked. 
because, with that wish comes something else...winter!"
Quickly she changed her mind and decided she doesn't want Christmas after all.

This little exchange got me to thinking about how when we examine our own 'wishes' often they are hinged to things we would never wish for again...
I remember being much younger,(ah, blissful youth:) sitting on the couch bursting into tears 
( something I did NOT do regularly) but Jim's pickup had quit on his way to work and we needed to call a tow-truck and I told him after adding up the bills, we are not going to make it!
but we did, in the same way our ancestors did 
and in the same way our young people will; 
one day at a time!





Saturday, February 10, 2018

To Thee, Lovely Maiden In Front Of The Mirror





To thee, lovely maiden in front of the mirror
Let thee by an older Fraulein, be forewarned
Thy raving locks will let thee down, my dearest
And leave thee like many a fair ‘Venus’, scorned

Thy beaming beauty will fade like a flower
Thy fairest form to Time’s hand is fair game
To thee, lovely maiden in front of the mirror
Fix thy joy on something years cannot maim 

...but if thou wouldst worship the face in the mirror
Beaming with pride at the hide we call Youth
Then, I pray listen to this tidbit of caution
Someone is waiting to show you the truth
 

© Janet Martin