Forever and Ever, Amen

The power is His Majesty

That metes the miracle

The glory is the part we see

That makes Him visible

The kings and kingdoms of this world

Exist for numbered days

God’s power and glory unfurled

Abides with us always

Amen.

Janet Martin

 For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.

Matt 6:13

Ocean-Front Property Or Something Like It...

This past week left me somewhat fatigued 

so I took a Monday-afternoon sabbatical...sort of.

To 'feel' an autumn day!

I had not yet taken the time this month to read the October chapter in the book

The Shape of a Year. Below is a peek at why this book is now in my top ten favs...

There's something comforting in the counsel of a golden, olden tree!

An autumn day can make one feel as wealthy as can be

A little like home-owners of ocean-front property

With cause for celebration for what creation achieves

Where earth is like a shoreline washed with waves of wind-tossed leaves

An autumn day can make us feel like colour connoisseurs

Although, we are all always awestruck autumn amateurs

The heart can savour flavours that evade the poet’s script

And it can sense an intense Silence, smoking-ember dipped

An autumn day can make one feel free and forever young

It tugs us from to-do lists to catch salt-breeze on our tongue

Before it is too late to seize its opportunity

Pretending we are owners of ocean-front property

An autumn day can make one feel unworthy of its ways

How sacred seems the canvas whereon Season spills its trays

The brush that paints its pictures for each one of us will cease

But not before we are all part of mercy’s masterpiece

An autumn day can make one feel undaunted by its spawn

Each moment like a leaf, one of so many, here then gone

Until the afternoon is drawn across a deep blue sea

That swallows all but echoes of ocean-front property

© Janet Martin

'why ocean-front property?" queried hubby...
'because the wind through the leaves in the trees and grass sounds like
waves washing across a shore,' I replied 😊

Exposition of Fall's Fruition

 The first verse of this poem was written on Saturday morning then duty prevailed, partly

so I could take fresh pie to a get-together celebrating my five favorite 'f' words...

family, friends, fall, fellowship and food!

This morning Victoria and I could do more than 'wish to wander'. We did.

Tree sheds its maroon halo in a mantle round its feet

The thread that wove its shadow cartwheels across yard and street

Time’s stark realities that do not spare the heart it seems

Are razor-sharp and easily slice through the skin of dreams

The chill wind is a fist that grips us by our swaddled scruff

And scolds us like a child in tones that feel a little gruff

And still, we cannot get enough where sweet and bitter meld

Leaf-petals waft as soft as thoughts of newborns we once held

The breeze through brittle cornfields sounds like summer’s midnight rain

I close my eyes and almost feel July steal through again

And I am glad that some things never lose their ‘my-oh-my’

Like distant fringe of blue-mauve hills that hinges earth to sky

A pageantry of pleasantries poses before it pools

The loom that weaves the plume begins exposing wooden spools

Yet fills our gaze with wonder as if we had never seen

The autumnal unraveling of gold, red, orange and green

The grace that grants the glance that soon we chase with rake and broom

Like unorthodox dancers in a four-season ballroom

Is the same grace whereby we weather winter’s chilling Must

And helps us brave the tether that teaches patience and trust

Creation heeds its Master, never sacrificing awe

Where Beauty breeds new beauty while subject to nature’s law

It does not grapple with the author of Authority

But yields what soon will dapple fields with life’s shucked filigree

Tree sheds its crown of glory, sort of like a jewel-storm

We feel a little sorry for its naked, gnarly form

But still are drawn toward its brooding, wooing masterpiece

Where the Creator’s touch stirs praise that will and cannot cease

© Janet Martin

To Read a Poem, Dear...

 A few poems read and reread recently...

To read a poem, dear

Takes very little time

Like tids-and-bits of love and cheer

Proportioned into rhyme

It creates common ground

Where we of sundry walk

Are somewhat all together bound

By simple tick and tock

To read a little verse

Penned for thought’s benefit

Can turn intentions we rehearse

Into ‘just doing it’

…and helps us realize

In just a line or two

How literature in bite-size

Is quite easy to chew

A poem is a hug

Across the years and miles

To mediate their tender tug

With ink-anointed smiles

Where, though Time takes its toll

And proof of progress spreads

The elements of heart and soul

 Are spun with ancient threads

To read a poem, dear

(though some may think it strange)

Helps us to balance now and here

With things that never change

© Janet Martin

Moment In Hand

 What a gorgeous morning!

For one micro-moment Victoria and I were caught wishing 

for freedom to wander autumn's frost-kissed wonderland, 

where the clock dictates so much of love and life's duties and desires.

"if there's one thing I've learned," I said to Victoria,
 "is just to make the most of the moment in hand so we don't
 miss the beauty of it because we were wishing for something else".

We don't live in a world without time-and-toil constraints. That's what Heaven is for! 

So we dash or dally and try to make the most of moments...

Night’s nebulous cocoon unfolds dawn like a butterfly

Time spreads its wings, alights upon earth’s plume and fills the sky

Where frosty kiss of Autumn while the world was still and dark

Has shattered nature’s colourful collage of leaf and bark

And scattered lofty orchestras that crooned all summer long

Beneath our feet, a music sheet of woodland’s remnant song

Come now, come now, my darling, do not weep for whispers spent

See how above our hunger Hope has pitched a seamless tent

And pulls us toward places we have never been before

Dawn’s virginal embraces draw us to a ballroom floor

To teach us how to try new steps in time’s determined dance

Where to sit on the sidelines is to miss life’s sweet romance

Earth’s heaven-glimpse of happiness unfurls its world of choice

Where we, without a word will give our utterances voice

Then pray we do not miss the melody moments compose

Or trample Mercy’s Butterfly perched on earth’s frost-kissed rose

For where so much is taken much remains yet to employ

The worship that when wakened overflows Hope’s cup of joy

Hello, sweet moment within reach, teach me to revel in

The awesome anthem trickling from an ancient violin

Help me to hear the harmonies that waft then softly fade

Into the prelude of arrangements waiting to be played

Where Mercy is the Maestro of most a momentous band

And we all hold an instrument of a moment in hand

© Janet Martin

Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is.
And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit,

...speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
 singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord,
Eph.5:17-19