Tuesday, February 11, 2020

For All We Face...




 Often the day is well on the way before the poem is complete...
and the lines get tucked in between toast, tea and other such crumbs and spills.

 
Let's pray our day is never not-so-well on its way 
because we didn't pray

We all need God so much whether our cares are great or small,
public or private, He cares for one and all
and in the prayer-room His peace frees us from fear's would-be shackles!
Aren't you thankful?! 


Ephesians 6:18
Pray in the Spirit at all times, with every kind of prayer and petition.
 To this end, stay alert with all perseverance 
in your prayers for all the saints.



From yonder portal of new day
Resounds Mercy’s role call
Where true believers bow to pray
No care too great or small
To lay before our gracious God
As long as life endures
We plea for grace to trust the rod
That tests what faith secures

The brunt of consequence unkind
The fear of the unknown
The snares set for the idle mind
The heart, as hard as stone
All these would fill a bitter cup
Hope would not be restored
Save for the pleas that we lift up
To pour before the Lord

Thus by God’s grace with prayer-braced might
We face what waits to be
We walk by faith and not by sight
Where God’s love sets us free
To live without fear’s binding dread
To rise above despair
To trust Him for what lies ahead
To hear our humble prayer

© Janet Martin




Monday, February 10, 2020

Castle (of a different kind)

This past weekend we visited Casa Loma in Toronto (story/history here)
 A dream-castle never completed...
Below is a teeny glimpse of but one of the many great accomplishments of once wealthy
Henry Pellatt who died penniless







After much amazement I was glad to return home to the welcome
 of a much more modest 'castle'
full of cracks and patches
and family!

The world is filled with castles unnoted by light of day
Though if one would take notice one might witness works of art
Not all towers and turrets are masterpieces of clay
The architect of love is at the mercy of the heart

The castles love constructs are made of plans oft run awry
The beauty it designs often revised or incomplete
Where images of outcomes once envisioned strew the sky
While love trips over mercy-sonnets scattered at its feet

The blueprint that love follows boasts no grand embellishment
No marble statuettes or glitz of crystal chandeliers
No domes showcasing frescoes or graven accomplishment
The sparkle of love’s castle glitters in laughter and tears

Its walls wear priceless scenes of days and years that came and went
It halls filled with familiar footsteps, not by gaping throngs
And though it may not leave its mark by some grand monument
It echoes with the lyrics of love's unrecorded songs

Love does not need the luxury of satin or brocade
Its rooms are not elaborate yet draw the longing eye
Where warm welcomes and loving arms feel almost heaven-made
The castle of contentment something money cannot buy



© Janet Martin






To We Who Were Undaunted...

  Love must be sincere....
 ...Be devoted to one another in love
Romans 12:9-10
 


To we who were undaunted
by the touch of Time until Her proof pressed into faces
places we can no longer deny and the means to the end
begins to tenderly instill the import of the echo and the imprint of the sigh.

To we who took our turn
among the less accountable but soon outgrew its shoes, to be the teacher, not the tot;
we ought to take to heart the Holy Inevitable and focus on the part that is
 rather than what-is-not

To we well over halfway marks
like man’s three-score and ten (or by reason of added strength the length of fourscore years)
Pray we have learned to love before the tree is hard to bend and the branch seems too brittle
 to soften with tears

To we who have lived long enough
to join the age-old rue that things are not the simpler, sounder way they used to be
 are we who witness Caution's Admonitions coming true, and bear the brunt of wisdom
with surprised humility

To we who seem too old to change
our very seasoned ways (save by the grace of He who doth with mighty Mercy move)
To we who now are daunted by man’s brevity of days. ..let’s take what yet remains of Time and
 turn it into love

© Janet Martin

or the traditional format if preferred...



To we who were undaunted by the touch of Time until
 Her proof pressed into faces places we can no longer deny
and the means to the end begins to tenderly instill
the import of the echo and the imprint of the sigh.


To we who took our turn among the less accountable
but soon outgrew its shoes, to be the teacher, not the tot;
we ought to take to heart the Holy Inevitable
 and focus on the part that is rather than what-is-not


To we well over halfway marks like man’s three-score and ten
 (or by reason of added strength the length of fourscore years)
 Pray we have learned to love before the tree is hard to bend
and the branch seems too brittle to soften with tears


To we who have lived long enough to join the age-old rue
 that things are not the simpler, sounder way they used to be
are we who witness Caution's Admonitions coming true,
 and bear the brunt of wisdom with surprised humility


To we who seem too old to change our very seasoned ways
(save by the grace of He who doth with mighty Mercy move)
To we who now are daunted by man’s brevity of days. ..
let’s take what yet remains of Time and turn it into love



© Janet Martin



Saturday, February 8, 2020

Winter, We Love-You-Love-You-Not Song





Winter, wake with wizened whispers of the hoary plume
Budded belvederes a-slumber in earth’s dormant womb
Woo, if but with frigid fretwork of frost filigree
The invasion of a network primed with petal-spree
Will, with ev’ry gale you muster, Beginnings beneath
Nearer with each bluster draws the daisy-dusted heath

Winter, warm us, not with kisses, but with bliss of this;
Always after your brouhaha, surely springtime Is
Teeming glimpse of Eden pulsing where winter, knee-deep
Warms the nucleus of nature with its icy sweep
While the throes of thermal stitching itch our swaddled skin
While we weather Weather, waiting for spring to begin

Winter, stir in us the common sense to feel your thrill
No other season is privy to the shades you spill
Where white wears a world of subtle colours in its gloss
(To try to describe it always leaves words at a loss)
Shimmering with glimmers like an ocean glazed with stars
Still-life waves, blue-capped, surge, picturesque, o’er prism bars

Winter, weave your wonders but keep your time-frame in mind
After you have wowed us with white, would you be so kind
As to take your leave before we weary of your ways
While we press our faces to sweet dreams of summer days
While we ooh and a-ah at what we bank on… (pard the pun)
Winter, you will lose yourself in the kiss of the sun

© Janet Martin