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Thursday, June 6, 2013

Of Numbered Days





When daylight fades cool and gold sun turns to pink
As shadows splay blue to the edge of earth’s brink
When refreshed intention that tuned morning’s spire
Drifts keenly in echoes of dream and desire
It seems I can feel soft, phantom fingertips
Gather its surreal caresses from my lips
Smoothing to the skyline its flicker of worth
Beneath a pavilion of heaven to earth
Where gladness and sadness like fire and ice
Burns through my stilled senses in ruthless solstice
The fine wine of love leaves its warmth to cajole
In whispering comfort swift seasons that roll
For grief is a beautiful thing golden-lined
As each passing year leaves its treasure behind
And love is a splendor of passion and pain
A turbulent tempest and tender refrain

How quick the dark night claims the dying of day
Snuffing the sun-wick that lights its little way
How soon the swift year is laid gently to rest
Its farewell song fades like daylight in the west
And all we can do as we pause on the edge
Of day slipping over time’s undaunted ledge
Is humbly relinquish into the soft air
The thought that forms mutely an un-uttered prayer
For none are immune to the vaunt of an hour
The winnowing tune plucking fronds from a flow’r
The best we can hope for in each season spent
Is learning the secret of being content
And never to cling to what must be let go
But treasure the measure of love’s precious flow
For we are sojourners and we cannot keep
One thread of a moment binding twilight’s deep

The chart of stark digits marks years on its page
It offers no hint of the heart’s tender stage
But candidly adds one more day to its cast
Robbing from the future to give to the past
We cannot thwart its unchallenged intent
And none can reimburse an hour when spent
The power and glory are returned full-fold
To He from which our life-story un-molds
And soon the repeat of night’s lowering sky
Croons moonlight-metered midnight’s lullaby
Pressing frost to the pumpkin then dew to spring-girth  
Seeds to the harvest and graves to the earth
When daylight fades deep over dusk-darkened hills
Folding to its hold living’s stumbles and spills
We lift our hearts to life’s Giver in praise
And murmur, ‘Lord, teach us to numbers our days’

© Janet Martin




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I hope you enjoyed your pause on this porch and thank-you for your visit!